What's on TV tonight: Michael Palin: a Life on Screen and Dancing on Ice

Sunday 7 January Michael Palin: a Life on Screen BBC Two, 9.00pm Telling Michael Palin’s story from his birth to the film Death of Stalin (in which he played Minister Molotov), this profile of the “Nicest Man in Showbiz” is a pleasure from start to finish. First realising his talents in improvised shows for his school friends, Palin found kindred spirits and his comic mojo as part of the Oxford Revue at the Edinburgh Festival, eventually parlaying his skills as a jobbing writer and performer into a series that changed the comedy landscape forever: Monty Python’s Flying Circus was born after an apparently disastrous meeting ended with a BBC commissioner pronouncing sternly, “all right, I’ll give you 13 episodes. But that’s all!” While John Cleese provides the tongue-in-cheek venom (describing Palin as “a sociopath”), Connie Booth, David Jason and Armando Iannucci pay tribute to a versatile talent. An abundance of clips confirm that alongside the comic genius of Python and Ripping Yarns lay a serious actor of genuine heft (as seen in GBH and Brazil), the gifted travel journalist of Around the World in 80 Days and a successful and engaging diarist. Palin, too, chips in with observations and memories, all delivered with charismatic humility and self-deprecation. Gabriel Tate Into the Forest BBC Three, from 10.00am This uneven but intriguing Canadian indie film didn’t find much of an audience when it was released in 2015 but will be now shown online via BBC Three. Evan Rachel Wood (Westworld) and Ellen Page (Juno) star in this dystopian drama as Nell and Eva, two sisters living in a forest with their father in the near future. They find their isolated existence under threat when a district-wide power cut sparks anarchy and increasing desperation in the nearby town. FA Cup Football: Shrewsbury Town v West Ham United BBC One, 1.40pm More potential giant-killing in the FA Cup, as League One side Shrewsbury Town try to cut down West Ham at Montgomery Waters Meadow. The visitors have won the FA Cup three times but haven’t lifted the trophy since 1980, when they beat Arsenal 1-0, thanks to a goal by Trevor Brooking. Shrewsbury made it through to the third round by beating against Aldershot Town and Morecambe. Premiership Rugby Union: Wasps v Saracens BT Sport 1, 2.30pm Having beaten Bath 31-26 at the Rec last weekend, Wasps look to continue their fine form in the new year at home to second-placed Saracens. The away side will be full of confidence, though: they capped off an impressive 2017 with a 46-31 victory over Worcester Warriors, with Jackson Wray and Nathan Earle both scoring try doubles as Saracens ran in six tries at Allianz Park. When these sides last met here, a hat-trick from Thomas Young helped Wasps to a 35-15 victory. A repeat performance here will see them leapfrog Saracens in the table. Dancing on Ice ITV, 6.00pm Back after a four-year absence, Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean return with Dancing on Ice, but they are no longer coaches. They are now be assessing the ice-skating abilities of a dozen celebrities, including Bucks Fizz alumna Cheryl Baker and Great British Bake Off 2016 champion Candice Brown. Joe Cocker Night Sky Arts, from 6.45pm One of the finest of all the white blues and soul shouters, Joe Cocker’s gargling, howling delivery was most famously captured in his performance of With a Little Help from My Friends at Woodstock. This double bill begins with the concert film Fire It Up: Live, and Cocker performing in Cologne on his final tour before his death in 2014. John Edginton’s biographical documentary, Mad Dog with Soul, follows at 9.00pm. GT Attenborough and the Sea Dragon BBC One, 8.00pm David Attenborough pursues his lifelong passion of fossilology on Britain’s Jurassic Coast. The 200-million-year-old bones of an Ichthyosaur must be dug out of the Dorset cliffs, analysed and finally recreated using computer technology. Vera ITV, 8.00pm The eighth series of the murder mystery begins with DCI Vera Stanhope (the excellent Brenda Blethyn) investigating how a respected fraud officer came to be incinerated in an abbatoir. Her enquiries lead her into a close-knit fishing community and clashes with her fellow coppers. The Biggest Little Railway in the World Channel 4, 8.00pm In this extraordinary venture, Dick Strawbridge and a team of fellow enthusiasts attempt to build a model railway to stretch 71 miles from Fort William to Inverness. The project will require viaducts, bridges and even a miniature ferry, all documented over the next five weeks. GT And Now for Something Completely Different (1971) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 10.00pm; N Ireland, 11.30pm Fans of Monty Python’s Flying Circus rejoice – this compilation film is a feast of the comedians’ favourite sketches from the first two TV series. With John Cleese introducing a number of scenes with: “And now, for something completely different”, it’s a fun trip into the archives, including as the “dead parrot” sketch. Captain Phillips (2013) ★★★★☆ ITV, 10.10pm Paul Greengrass (United 93 and three Bourne films) has a rare gift for working with action-thriller material and making something cohesive, layered and complex from it. With this account of Somali pirates boarding an American cargo ship and kidnapping its captain (Tom Hanks), he remains at the top of his game. Hanks may be the big draw, but it’s the pirates who impress, especially Bafta-winning Barkhad Abdi. Stations of the Cross (2015) ★★★☆☆ BBC Four, 11.00pm This cold, preachy German film from director Dietrich Brüggemann plays out over 14 single-shot scenes, each titled after a station of the cross on Christ’s walk to Calvary and to mirror the restrictions of religious fundamentalism. Its story, about a 14-year-old girl who pursues the ideals of Christian self-sacrifice to terrifying extremes, won the best script gong at the Berlin International Film Festival. Monday 8 January Archie Panjabi Credit: ITV Next of Kin ITV, 9.00pm Written by Indian Summers creator Paul Rutman and partner Natasha Narayan, this atmospheric six-part thriller has a fine cast and gets off to an instantly intriguing start. Emmy-winner Archie Panjabi is a smart and sympathetic presence as British-Pakistani doctor Mona Harcourt, who, together with her well-connected political lobbyist husband Guy (Jack Davenport) and wider family, is preparing to celebrate the return from Lahore of her beloved brother Kareem (Navin Chowdhry). His failure to arrive as expected on the day a terrorist incident in London results in four deaths, and brings the city to a standstill. It sets in motion a series of terrifying consequences – the most disturbing of which is the sudden intense interest in the family of the anti-terrorism unit of the Metropolitan Police. It is a credible, and in parts distressing, depiction of what it is like to be an ordinary British Muslim in the wake of such an attack, especially when it emerges that the real focus of the police investigation is not Kareem, but his 18-year-old student son Danny (Viveik Kalra) who had been becoming increasingly isolated from the family in the weeks before the attack. Gerard O’Donovan Star Trek: Discovery Netflix, from today Following an eight-week break, the latest incarnation of the Star Trek franchise returns to complete its debut run. The previous episode ended on a twist that saw the USS Discovery cast out into unchartered space. Unsurprisingly, this 10th episode picks up with Captain Lorca (Jason Isaacs) and crew facing a raft of previously unimagined threats in their eventful efforts to find a way home. How to Lose Weight Well Channel 4, 8.00pm Dr Xand van Tulleken and dietician Hala El-Shafie take a new approach to diet testing, dividing a group of volunteers into three categories: crashers (short-term diets), shape shifters (six-week programmes) and life changers (four-month plans) to see which of the current popular diets are most effective. Silent Witness BBC One, 9.00pm The enduringly popular pathologists-playing-cops drama kicks off its 21st series with a typically slow burn two-parter. As Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) struggles to get over her Mexican ordeal, a close friend (Emma Fielding) goes missing. Surgeons: At the Edge of Life BBC Two, 9.00pm Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham’s busy surgical unit is the focus of this new series following surgeons, theatre staff and patients through operations at the cutting edge of medicine. In the first edition, maxillofacial surgeons tackle a marathon operation on a 53-year-old diagnosed with a major facial tumour. My Astonishing Self: Gabriel Byrne on George Bernard Shaw BBC Four, 9.00pm An actor’s homage to a playwright becomes a fascinating exploration of the life and work of a literary Titan of the early 20th century.George Bernard Shaw was a pioneering socialist, feminist and philosopher as well as the writer of hugely popular plays such as Pygmalion. Here, Gabriel Byrne assesses the character and legacy of a man whose intelligence, charm and social conscience, and ingenuity for self-promotion, propelled him to global renown. GO The Undateables Channel 4, 9.00pm A fresh crop of singletons looking for love includes a rugby-playing chef from Hull with Tourette’s, a bookseller from Cambridgeshire with Asperger’s, and a photography graduate from London with scoliosis. GO Gallipoli (1981) ★★★★★ Film4, 6.35pm Director Peter Weir’s tale of war and friendship in 1915 – one of his very finest films – reaches a devastating finale in the clash between Australians and Turks on the shore of the Dardanelles. Mel Gibson’s race through the trenches with a crucial message – ignore the last order! – is more pulse-quickening than a dozen Bravehearts. You pray for him to beat that whistle every time. Harold Hopkins also stars. Life of Pi (2012) ★★★★★ E4, 8.00pm Ang Lee’s warm, wise and wondrous adventure story, adapted from Yann Martel’s 2002 Booker Prize-winning novel, follows Pi (Suraj Sharma), shipwrecked in the South Pacific with Richard Parker, a Bengal tiger named after the hunter who captured him. Its kaleidoscopic imagery is some of the most advanced ever, but the story unfolds with such simplicity and clarity that it could almost be a silent movie. Logan (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Hugh Jackman’s third – and best – lone outing for his whiskery mutant Wolverine. You might assume James Mangold’s film, set in the near future, where a weary Logan meets a young mutant much like himself, is meant as a sequel to the two other Wolverine movies, but watching it, you’re struck by the thought that this paranoid, violent noir western is the real, shotgun-toting deal. Tuesday 9 January Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Credit: AFP House of Saud: A Family at War BBC Two, 9.00pm This detailed three-part series on the ruling family of Saudi Arabia makes for unmissable if terrifying television. Dispensing with any sort of Adam Curtis-style frills, the opening film simply talks us through the House of Saud’s involvement in recent history, from Sarajevo to Syria. Hearing from intelligence analysts and long-time Saudi observers, it builds a complicated picture of the uneasy relationship between the Saudi royal family and Wahhabism, the particular strain of Islam they promote. It’s a story that encompasses a small hamlet in Bosnia, a family home in India, weapons dealt from Bulgaria to Afghanistan and online films watched all over the world. Much is made of the new Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and his desire for reform (“It’s not a question of how important he is to this – he is this,” announces one observer) but it remains hard to judge just how much of his actions are driven by genuine belief and how much constitute a power grab. Ultimately what lingers is not the political revelations, interesting though they are, but the interviews with the blinded of Syria, the wounded of Iraq, the devastated of Bosnia: the countless casualties of the geopolitical game. Sarah Hughes England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm Tudor England might seem like a subject that has been covered so much that there is nothing new to be said about it. But hold on to those gripes because Helen Castor’s detailed look at the nine-day reign of Lady Jane Grey is an invigorating, intelligent take on the period. Using a wide range of old documents and interesting voices, Castor guides us through Jane’s brief, unlucky life, examining how she ended up as a pawn between two powerful factions and why it was that she found herself raised from relative obscurity to the dizzying heights of the English throne. School for Stammerers ITV, 9.00pm Speech impediments can be devastating to live with, as this thoughtful film, which follows six people living with a stammer, demonstrates. One solution on offer is the intensive McGuire Programme, a residential course that promises life-changing results albeit under tough conditions. 24 Hours in A&E Channel 4, 9.00pm The fly-on-the-wall medical series continues with this week’s patients including Marie, who arrives by ambulance at St George’s Hospital having collapsed at home with an unexplained headache. The Blacklist Sky One, 9.00pm The ludicrous and yet strangely enjoyable US spy series continues with James Spader’s slick Red this week setting his sights on wealthy art thief Greyson Blaise (Owain Yeoman). While Red gallivants abroad Tom (Ryan Eggold) seeks help to identify the bones in the suitcase. SH Inside No 9 BBC Two, 10.00pm This melancholy tale in the excellent comedy anthology is of rivalry and friendship lost. Reece Shearsmith is Tommy, who grumpily agrees to perform with former stand-up partner Len (Steve Pemberton), 30 years after they split in mysterious circumstances. Working Class White Men Channel 4, 10.00pm Rapper Professor Green has been quietly making a name for himself as a film-maker and this fascinating film about white working-class men is one of the week’s highlights. Green’s tense meeting with Britain First will garner the headlines but there is hope here too, with Lewis, the teenage would-be mathematician, the show’s highlight. SH The Fault in Our Stars (2014) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 9.00pm Josh Boone’s film, adapted from the phenomenally successful young-adult novel, about two American teenagers both diagnosed with cancer is wisely observed and tenderly performed, most notably by Shailene Woodley. The basic storyline is so worn it’s close to threadbare – Love Story told it more than 40 years ago – but it comes with enough quirks to give it the appearance of freshness. The Lincoln Lawyer (2011) ★★★☆☆ More4, 9.00pm He won acclaim for his role as enigmatic detective Rust Cohle in the TV series True Detective, but Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey stars here in the sort of courtroom drama for which he made his name. This time he’s Mick Haller, a slick LA defence lawyer who prefers to represent the guilty. However, a wealthy new client (Ryan Phillippe) prompts Haller to address his own past sins. Billy Liar (1963, b/w) ★★★☆☆ London Live, 12.00midnight Best known for Midnight Cowboy, for which he won three Oscars, John Schlesinger ranged from violent thrillers (Marathon Man) to romantic epics (Far from the Madding Crowd) to perceptive human studies (An Englishman Abroad), but he indicated the breadth of his ambitions with this gritty social drama featuring Tom Courtenay as an undertaker’s clerk with extravagant fantasies. Wednesday 10 January Sarah Lancashire Credit: Channel 4 Kiri Channel 4, 9.00pm Screenwriter Jack Thorne follows up the excellent National Treasure with another superbly cast, nimble and dark exploration of contemporary mores. Thorne’s careful research is all over this opening episode of four, yet it never feels didactic or clumsy. Kiri follows the investigation into the abduction of the titular black girl Kiri Akindele (Felicia Mukasa) by her birth family, just days before she is due to be adopted by her white foster family, headed up by Lia Williams and Steven Mackintosh. Sarah Lancashire plays Miriam Grayson, the social worker who allows Kiri’s ill-fated unsupervised visit. Lancashire picks her projects carefully, and this is a performance to rank alongside her Bafta-winning turn in Happy Valley: Miriam is an imperfect Samaritan, trying her best amid funding cuts, weak superiors and a dormant drink problem. From the moment that the girl disappears and director Euros Lyn’s colour palette darkens, the focus seems to be as much on apportioning blame as finding the missing girl. It’s a desperate situation shot through with guilt and human frailty, yet not without humour; another modern tragedy from a writer who specialises in them. Gabriel Tate The Truth About Looking Good BBC One, 8.00pm Cherry Healey and 25 volunteers and experts from the Universities of Sheffield and Sunderland join forces to separate scientific fact from marketing fiction in the £9 billion per annum industry of cosmetics, in particular weighing up the pros and cons of moisturisers and cellulite solutions. Britain’s Brightest Family ITV, 8.00pm Anne Hegerty – familiar as The Chase’s Governess – oversees a new quiz show in which family members must show off their own general knowledge and nominate relatives according to their perceived areas of expertise. A Stitch in Time BBC Four, 8.30pm This fascinating series finds fashion historian Amber Butchart displaying a variety of eye-catching headgear to scrutinise Jan van Eyck’s The Arnolfini Portrait for clues about its subjects and the 15th-century world that they inhabited. Couturier Ninya Mikhaila, meanwhile, recreates the green gown worn by the painting’s pregnant woman. Miriam’s Big American Adventure BBC One, 9.00pm; Scotland, 10.45pm Miriam Margolyes hits Middle America, where she encounters young Indiana summer campers pledging their allegiance, slightly older drug casualties in Ohio and survivalists of all ages in Tennessee. Fighting for Air BBC Two, 9.00pm Campaigning doctor and inescapable TV face Xand van Tulleken examines the grim effects of air pollution on the body, before travelling to Birmingham to bring clean air to one high street using a combination of technological expertise and community goodwill. GT England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm While dedicating three hours to just nine days of British history might seem like overkill, here it almost feels inadequate, such is the wealth of incident and intrigue in Dr Helen Castor’s series. This middle episode follows the five days that determined whether or not Lady Jane would survive on the throne. The reconstructions are decent and the CGI sparingly used; instead, Castor lets the experts do the talking in an engaging piece of narrative history, concluding tomorrow. GT Tunes of Glory (1960) ★★★☆☆ Movies4Men, 4.00pm British director Ronald Neame made some of the best-known films of the 20th century, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Poseidon Adventure, but this was his personal favourite. It focuses on personal rivalries within a fictional Highland regiment after the Second World War. John Mills plays a new, authoritarian CO, and Alec Guinness – cast against type – gives an exceptional performance as his lax, hard-drinking predecessor. JFK (1991) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.55pm Oliver Stone is in conspiracy-theorist mode for this film about the murder of President John F Kennedy. Whatever you make of Stone’s theory that the assassination was an FBI plot, lawyer Jim Garrison’s (Kevin Costner) showdown moment when he demonstrates that JFK was killed by multiple bullets is jaw-dropping. Costner, fresh from the Oscars glory of Dances with Wolves, is a magnetic lead. The Social Network (2010) ★★★★★ Channel 4, 1.10am Jesse Eisenberg is superb as the gauche cyber-geek who became a billionaire in his twenties in this dazzling dramatisation of the story of Facebook. It may necessarily be speculative in parts about Mark Zuckerberg and his invention, but this is a brilliantly scripted and absolutely gripping tale of clashing egos, precocious talent and betrayal. Justin Timberlake and Andrew Garfield also star. Thursday 11 January Cheetahs in Namibia Credit: BBC Big Cats BBC One, 8.00pm One family, 40 different faces. That’s how this beautifully shot three-part series about the planet’s top wild predator, the cat, begins – with a kaleidoscope of feline faces that perfectly illustrates the huge variety and essential similarity between the many different branches of the family. Not all of them are big. One, the rusty-spotted cat – a kittenish, ultra-rare inhabitant of Sri Lanka’s jungles – is so tiny when fully grown that it can fit in the palm of your hand. Although it makes up for its small stature with surprising ferocity. The series took two years and 30 separate filming expeditions to make, travelling to all four corners of the globe to show just how adaptable wild cats have evolved to be. In this opening edition we see not only relatively familiar sights such as cheetahs and lions chasing down water buffalo and giraffe in Africa, but also some rarities, such as a snow leopard searching the Himalayas for a mate. Plus, Siberian tigers and the elusive Canada lynx make appearances. There are surprises, too, in footage of jaguars taking on caiman in the waters of the Pantanal, and pumas hunting penguin on the freezing southern shores of Patagonia. Gerard O’Donovan European Tour Golf: The BMW SA Open Sky Sports Main Event, 8.00am Action from the opening day’s play at the City of Ekurhuleni in Gauteng, South Africa, where Graeme Storm was the winner last year. Having very nearly lost his tour card in 2016, the Englishman defeated Northern Irish star Rory McIlroy in a play-off to win his second title on the tour and his first since the 2007 Open de France. EastEnders BBC One, 7.30pm Mel Owen (Tamzin Outhwaite) returns to Albert Square after a 16-year absence. Last time around she married twice, burnt down a nightclub, was kidnapped and slept with her best friend’s husband. So the producers’ promise of an “incredible” storyline for her comeback is probably, uh, credible. The Cruise: Return to the Mediterranean ITV, 8.30pm More stories of life on the cruise ship Royal Princess. Tonight, with 5,000 passengers and crew aboard, bad weather prevents the cruise ship from docking. England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm The concluding part of Helen Castor’s fascinating account of England’s “nine-day queen” opens on the eighth day of her reign, with armies heading for Framlingham Castle where her Catholic rival for the throne, Mary Tudor, had assembled a powerful force. Within a day, 16-year-old Jane would be betrayed, abandoned and consigned to the Tower of London. But her legacy, according to Castor, was far greater than her brief time on the throne suggests. Transformation Street ITV, 9.00pm Wimpole Street, Marylebone, is home to the London Transgender Surgery, a private clinic catering for some of the estimated 130,000 Britons currently wishing to change gender. This revealing three-parter follows patients from initial consultations through to gender confirmation surgery. Walks with My Dog More4, 9.00pm The simple but engaging series in which celebrities take their four-legged friends for a trek through the UK’s more scenic parts makes a welcome return. This time Hadrian’s Wall, Norfolk and the Welsh mountains are among the destinations. Actress Caroline Quentin leads off tonight, taking her pooch for a stroll around the Helford estuary in Cornwall. GO Great Art ITV, 10.45pm In this second episode of the art series, Tim Marlow moves on to the 19th-century Parisian art collector Paul Durand-Ruel, whose financially risky landmark 1886 exhibition in New York thrust impressionism into the mainstream. Marlow examines his impact, and the lasting influence of Monet, Cézanne, Degas and Renoir. GO From Russia with Love (1963) ★★★★☆ ITV4, 9.00pm Ah, those were the days: the certainties of the Cold War, a beautiful Soviet defector and a chase across the Balkans. Will Spectre avenge the death of Dr No? No chance. Sean Connery was in the swing of things in his second outing as James Bond, pursued by two of 007’s best adversaries, in “Red” Grant (Robert Shaw) and Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya). Terence Young directs. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.15pm This superb adaptation of John le Carré’s brilliant, intricate Cold War spy novel is a triumph. The espionage drama follows the hunt for a Soviet double agent at the top of the British secret service, with Gary Oldman spearheading the excellent ensemble cast, which includes Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt and Benedict Cumberbatch. It’s funny, seductive and suspenseful. GoodFellas (1990) ★★★★★ ITV4, 11.25pm Martin Scorsese’s Mafia masterpiece, adapted from a non-fiction book, has all the qualities of great cinema: it’s thrilling, it’s provocative, it’s stylish, and it’s got a young Robert De Niro in it. Ray Liotta plays the youngster who longs to be a gangster; De Niro and Joe Pesci are in the Mob. Pesci’s mother, meanwhile, reportedly asked him if he had to swear quite so much – the f-word is used 300 times. Friday 12 January Revd Matthew Stafford, Revd Nicholas Lowton, Fr Matthew Cashmore and Revd Ruth Hulse Credit: BBC A Vicar’s Life BBC Two, 8.30pm This amiable new series follows several vicars in their parishes in the Diocese of Hereford, the most rural in the Church of England. It’s the standard heart-warming mixture of births, marriages and deaths – or as likeable Reverend Matthew Stafford, vicar at the village of Much Wenlock, says: “hatched, matched and dispatched” – but, for all that sense of familiarity, it’s well-made and very engaging. This opening episode sees Matthew officiate at a lovely local wedding, and Reverend Nicholas Lowton, the Rural Dean of Abbeydore and Vicar of the Black Mountains Group, deal with the theft of the parish registry books (“whoever did this has got lessons that they need to learn”). Elsewhere, Reverend Ruth Hulse, Team Vicar for West Hereford, organises a funeral for much-loved former churchwarden Barbara. “It’s a huge loss, like losing a member of your own family,” she says. Everyone involved comes out of it well, and Matthew manages to sneak a message in amid the jokes: “I don’t take myself seriously, but I do take God and what I do very seriously,” he notes. So do his parishioners, many of whom admit that he’s helped them see the church in a more favourable light. Sarah Hughes PGA Tour Golf: The Sony Open Sky Sports Main Event, 12.01am The opening day of the tournament at the Waialae CC in Honolulu, Hawaii, where Justin Thomas won the title last year. Room 101 BBC One, 8.30pm Frank Skinner returns with a new series of the long-running show. This opener promises to be a lot of fun given that his guests, Charlie Brooker, Scarlett Moffatt and Pearl Mackie, are not short of opinion. Among the objects up for inclusion in Room 101 are crocodiles, mosquitos and haircuts. Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm The second part of this food and art travelogue sees chef Giorgio Locatelli and art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon visit the Basilica di San Clemente, the Testaccio Slaughterhouse and the Palazzo Colonna. As before, a great deal of the fun comes from the way that each man learns from the other. David Bowie Evening BBC Four, from 9.00pm Two years after David Bowie’s death, BBC Four dedicates an evening to the rock great. First up is Francis Whately’s 2013 film David Bowie: Five Years in the Making of an Icon, which looks at key moments in his career. These include his time as Ziggy Stardust, his reinvention as the Thin White Duke, the making of 1977’s Heroes, and the global success of Let’s Dance. It’s followed by David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust, which looks at how Bowie created his most (in)famous alter ego. Lethal Weapon ITV, 9.00pm The rambunctious remake of the Danny Glover-Mel Gibson films roars back for a second series. It begins with an action-packed episode that sees Murtaugh (Damon Wayans) heading to Mexico to try to reign in partner Riggs (Clayne Crawford) who is still seeking vengeance for his wife’s death. Delicious Sky One, 9.00pm The second series of the foodie drama reaches its penultimate episode, and it’s the anniversary of philanderer Leo’s death, which the families plan to mark with a feast. Naturally, nothing goes smoothly – chef Gina (Dawn French) is pushed to the limits by her daughter Theresa’s (Tanya Reynolds) behaviour, while Gina’s love rival turned business partner Sam (Emilia Fox) takes out her anger on chef Adam (Aaron Anthony). SH The Graham Norton Show BBC One, 10.35pm Expect a super-smooth evening as Graham Norton is joined by A-listers Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, who discuss Steven Spielberg’s political drama The Post, but also share some good anecdotes amid all the mild ribbing. SH The Polka King (2017) Netflix, from today Exuberant Jack Black plays to his strengths in this biopic, based on the documentary The Man Who Would Be Polka King, about a flamboyant Polish émigré-turned-Polka King-turned-convicted Ponzi-scheme criminal. Despite being a film about a scoundrel who swindled senior citizens out of millions of dollars in order to achieve the American dream, it’s surprisingly entertaining, though a more serious consideration of con artists wouldn’t have gone amiss. The Frogmen (1951, b/w) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 4.35pm A pleasingly understated yet atmospheric war drama in which Richard Widmark stars as a tough Navy commander put in charge of a team of demolition divers on a South Pacific island. At first, the arrival of their superior goes down like a lead diving suit, but he soon wins them over by neutralising an undetonated torpedo. Due to the conditions being deemed too “riotous”, the female roles were written out. Get Out (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Get Out is one of the first films expressly to be set in a post-Obama era and is a breathlessly suspenseful exposé of the horror of liberal racism. Perfect, white Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) wants to allay the concerns of her boyfriend, black photographer Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), and invites him to meet her parents. They don’t bat an eyelid over his skin colour, but the film rattles with provocations. Television previewers Toby Dantzic, Catherine Gee, Simon Horsford, Sarah Hughes, Clive Morgan, Gerard O'Donovan, Vicki Power, Patrick Smith, Gabriel Tate and Rachel Ward

What's on TV tonight: Michael Palin: a Life on Screen and Dancing on Ice

Sunday 7 January Michael Palin: a Life on Screen BBC Two, 9.00pm Telling Michael Palin’s story from his birth to the film Death of Stalin (in which he played Minister Molotov), this profile of the “Nicest Man in Showbiz” is a pleasure from start to finish. First realising his talents in improvised shows for his school friends, Palin found kindred spirits and his comic mojo as part of the Oxford Revue at the Edinburgh Festival, eventually parlaying his skills as a jobbing writer and performer into a series that changed the comedy landscape forever: Monty Python’s Flying Circus was born after an apparently disastrous meeting ended with a BBC commissioner pronouncing sternly, “all right, I’ll give you 13 episodes. But that’s all!” While John Cleese provides the tongue-in-cheek venom (describing Palin as “a sociopath”), Connie Booth, David Jason and Armando Iannucci pay tribute to a versatile talent. An abundance of clips confirm that alongside the comic genius of Python and Ripping Yarns lay a serious actor of genuine heft (as seen in GBH and Brazil), the gifted travel journalist of Around the World in 80 Days and a successful and engaging diarist. Palin, too, chips in with observations and memories, all delivered with charismatic humility and self-deprecation. Gabriel Tate Into the Forest BBC Three, from 10.00am This uneven but intriguing Canadian indie film didn’t find much of an audience when it was released in 2015 but will be now shown online via BBC Three. Evan Rachel Wood (Westworld) and Ellen Page (Juno) star in this dystopian drama as Nell and Eva, two sisters living in a forest with their father in the near future. They find their isolated existence under threat when a district-wide power cut sparks anarchy and increasing desperation in the nearby town. FA Cup Football: Shrewsbury Town v West Ham United BBC One, 1.40pm More potential giant-killing in the FA Cup, as League One side Shrewsbury Town try to cut down West Ham at Montgomery Waters Meadow. The visitors have won the FA Cup three times but haven’t lifted the trophy since 1980, when they beat Arsenal 1-0, thanks to a goal by Trevor Brooking. Shrewsbury made it through to the third round by beating against Aldershot Town and Morecambe. Premiership Rugby Union: Wasps v Saracens BT Sport 1, 2.30pm Having beaten Bath 31-26 at the Rec last weekend, Wasps look to continue their fine form in the new year at home to second-placed Saracens. The away side will be full of confidence, though: they capped off an impressive 2017 with a 46-31 victory over Worcester Warriors, with Jackson Wray and Nathan Earle both scoring try doubles as Saracens ran in six tries at Allianz Park. When these sides last met here, a hat-trick from Thomas Young helped Wasps to a 35-15 victory. A repeat performance here will see them leapfrog Saracens in the table. Dancing on Ice ITV, 6.00pm Back after a four-year absence, Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean return with Dancing on Ice, but they are no longer coaches. They are now be assessing the ice-skating abilities of a dozen celebrities, including Bucks Fizz alumna Cheryl Baker and Great British Bake Off 2016 champion Candice Brown. Joe Cocker Night Sky Arts, from 6.45pm One of the finest of all the white blues and soul shouters, Joe Cocker’s gargling, howling delivery was most famously captured in his performance of With a Little Help from My Friends at Woodstock. This double bill begins with the concert film Fire It Up: Live, and Cocker performing in Cologne on his final tour before his death in 2014. John Edginton’s biographical documentary, Mad Dog with Soul, follows at 9.00pm. GT Attenborough and the Sea Dragon BBC One, 8.00pm David Attenborough pursues his lifelong passion of fossilology on Britain’s Jurassic Coast. The 200-million-year-old bones of an Ichthyosaur must be dug out of the Dorset cliffs, analysed and finally recreated using computer technology. Vera ITV, 8.00pm The eighth series of the murder mystery begins with DCI Vera Stanhope (the excellent Brenda Blethyn) investigating how a respected fraud officer came to be incinerated in an abbatoir. Her enquiries lead her into a close-knit fishing community and clashes with her fellow coppers. The Biggest Little Railway in the World Channel 4, 8.00pm In this extraordinary venture, Dick Strawbridge and a team of fellow enthusiasts attempt to build a model railway to stretch 71 miles from Fort William to Inverness. The project will require viaducts, bridges and even a miniature ferry, all documented over the next five weeks. GT And Now for Something Completely Different (1971) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 10.00pm; N Ireland, 11.30pm Fans of Monty Python’s Flying Circus rejoice – this compilation film is a feast of the comedians’ favourite sketches from the first two TV series. With John Cleese introducing a number of scenes with: “And now, for something completely different”, it’s a fun trip into the archives, including as the “dead parrot” sketch. Captain Phillips (2013) ★★★★☆ ITV, 10.10pm Paul Greengrass (United 93 and three Bourne films) has a rare gift for working with action-thriller material and making something cohesive, layered and complex from it. With this account of Somali pirates boarding an American cargo ship and kidnapping its captain (Tom Hanks), he remains at the top of his game. Hanks may be the big draw, but it’s the pirates who impress, especially Bafta-winning Barkhad Abdi. Stations of the Cross (2015) ★★★☆☆ BBC Four, 11.00pm This cold, preachy German film from director Dietrich Brüggemann plays out over 14 single-shot scenes, each titled after a station of the cross on Christ’s walk to Calvary and to mirror the restrictions of religious fundamentalism. Its story, about a 14-year-old girl who pursues the ideals of Christian self-sacrifice to terrifying extremes, won the best script gong at the Berlin International Film Festival. Monday 8 January Archie Panjabi Credit: ITV Next of Kin ITV, 9.00pm Written by Indian Summers creator Paul Rutman and partner Natasha Narayan, this atmospheric six-part thriller has a fine cast and gets off to an instantly intriguing start. Emmy-winner Archie Panjabi is a smart and sympathetic presence as British-Pakistani doctor Mona Harcourt, who, together with her well-connected political lobbyist husband Guy (Jack Davenport) and wider family, is preparing to celebrate the return from Lahore of her beloved brother Kareem (Navin Chowdhry). His failure to arrive as expected on the day a terrorist incident in London results in four deaths, and brings the city to a standstill. It sets in motion a series of terrifying consequences – the most disturbing of which is the sudden intense interest in the family of the anti-terrorism unit of the Metropolitan Police. It is a credible, and in parts distressing, depiction of what it is like to be an ordinary British Muslim in the wake of such an attack, especially when it emerges that the real focus of the police investigation is not Kareem, but his 18-year-old student son Danny (Viveik Kalra) who had been becoming increasingly isolated from the family in the weeks before the attack. Gerard O’Donovan Star Trek: Discovery Netflix, from today Following an eight-week break, the latest incarnation of the Star Trek franchise returns to complete its debut run. The previous episode ended on a twist that saw the USS Discovery cast out into unchartered space. Unsurprisingly, this 10th episode picks up with Captain Lorca (Jason Isaacs) and crew facing a raft of previously unimagined threats in their eventful efforts to find a way home. How to Lose Weight Well Channel 4, 8.00pm Dr Xand van Tulleken and dietician Hala El-Shafie take a new approach to diet testing, dividing a group of volunteers into three categories: crashers (short-term diets), shape shifters (six-week programmes) and life changers (four-month plans) to see which of the current popular diets are most effective. Silent Witness BBC One, 9.00pm The enduringly popular pathologists-playing-cops drama kicks off its 21st series with a typically slow burn two-parter. As Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) struggles to get over her Mexican ordeal, a close friend (Emma Fielding) goes missing. Surgeons: At the Edge of Life BBC Two, 9.00pm Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham’s busy surgical unit is the focus of this new series following surgeons, theatre staff and patients through operations at the cutting edge of medicine. In the first edition, maxillofacial surgeons tackle a marathon operation on a 53-year-old diagnosed with a major facial tumour. My Astonishing Self: Gabriel Byrne on George Bernard Shaw BBC Four, 9.00pm An actor’s homage to a playwright becomes a fascinating exploration of the life and work of a literary Titan of the early 20th century.George Bernard Shaw was a pioneering socialist, feminist and philosopher as well as the writer of hugely popular plays such as Pygmalion. Here, Gabriel Byrne assesses the character and legacy of a man whose intelligence, charm and social conscience, and ingenuity for self-promotion, propelled him to global renown. GO The Undateables Channel 4, 9.00pm A fresh crop of singletons looking for love includes a rugby-playing chef from Hull with Tourette’s, a bookseller from Cambridgeshire with Asperger’s, and a photography graduate from London with scoliosis. GO Gallipoli (1981) ★★★★★ Film4, 6.35pm Director Peter Weir’s tale of war and friendship in 1915 – one of his very finest films – reaches a devastating finale in the clash between Australians and Turks on the shore of the Dardanelles. Mel Gibson’s race through the trenches with a crucial message – ignore the last order! – is more pulse-quickening than a dozen Bravehearts. You pray for him to beat that whistle every time. Harold Hopkins also stars. Life of Pi (2012) ★★★★★ E4, 8.00pm Ang Lee’s warm, wise and wondrous adventure story, adapted from Yann Martel’s 2002 Booker Prize-winning novel, follows Pi (Suraj Sharma), shipwrecked in the South Pacific with Richard Parker, a Bengal tiger named after the hunter who captured him. Its kaleidoscopic imagery is some of the most advanced ever, but the story unfolds with such simplicity and clarity that it could almost be a silent movie. Logan (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Hugh Jackman’s third – and best – lone outing for his whiskery mutant Wolverine. You might assume James Mangold’s film, set in the near future, where a weary Logan meets a young mutant much like himself, is meant as a sequel to the two other Wolverine movies, but watching it, you’re struck by the thought that this paranoid, violent noir western is the real, shotgun-toting deal. Tuesday 9 January Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Credit: AFP House of Saud: A Family at War BBC Two, 9.00pm This detailed three-part series on the ruling family of Saudi Arabia makes for unmissable if terrifying television. Dispensing with any sort of Adam Curtis-style frills, the opening film simply talks us through the House of Saud’s involvement in recent history, from Sarajevo to Syria. Hearing from intelligence analysts and long-time Saudi observers, it builds a complicated picture of the uneasy relationship between the Saudi royal family and Wahhabism, the particular strain of Islam they promote. It’s a story that encompasses a small hamlet in Bosnia, a family home in India, weapons dealt from Bulgaria to Afghanistan and online films watched all over the world. Much is made of the new Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and his desire for reform (“It’s not a question of how important he is to this – he is this,” announces one observer) but it remains hard to judge just how much of his actions are driven by genuine belief and how much constitute a power grab. Ultimately what lingers is not the political revelations, interesting though they are, but the interviews with the blinded of Syria, the wounded of Iraq, the devastated of Bosnia: the countless casualties of the geopolitical game. Sarah Hughes England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm Tudor England might seem like a subject that has been covered so much that there is nothing new to be said about it. But hold on to those gripes because Helen Castor’s detailed look at the nine-day reign of Lady Jane Grey is an invigorating, intelligent take on the period. Using a wide range of old documents and interesting voices, Castor guides us through Jane’s brief, unlucky life, examining how she ended up as a pawn between two powerful factions and why it was that she found herself raised from relative obscurity to the dizzying heights of the English throne. School for Stammerers ITV, 9.00pm Speech impediments can be devastating to live with, as this thoughtful film, which follows six people living with a stammer, demonstrates. One solution on offer is the intensive McGuire Programme, a residential course that promises life-changing results albeit under tough conditions. 24 Hours in A&E Channel 4, 9.00pm The fly-on-the-wall medical series continues with this week’s patients including Marie, who arrives by ambulance at St George’s Hospital having collapsed at home with an unexplained headache. The Blacklist Sky One, 9.00pm The ludicrous and yet strangely enjoyable US spy series continues with James Spader’s slick Red this week setting his sights on wealthy art thief Greyson Blaise (Owain Yeoman). While Red gallivants abroad Tom (Ryan Eggold) seeks help to identify the bones in the suitcase. SH Inside No 9 BBC Two, 10.00pm This melancholy tale in the excellent comedy anthology is of rivalry and friendship lost. Reece Shearsmith is Tommy, who grumpily agrees to perform with former stand-up partner Len (Steve Pemberton), 30 years after they split in mysterious circumstances. Working Class White Men Channel 4, 10.00pm Rapper Professor Green has been quietly making a name for himself as a film-maker and this fascinating film about white working-class men is one of the week’s highlights. Green’s tense meeting with Britain First will garner the headlines but there is hope here too, with Lewis, the teenage would-be mathematician, the show’s highlight. SH The Fault in Our Stars (2014) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 9.00pm Josh Boone’s film, adapted from the phenomenally successful young-adult novel, about two American teenagers both diagnosed with cancer is wisely observed and tenderly performed, most notably by Shailene Woodley. The basic storyline is so worn it’s close to threadbare – Love Story told it more than 40 years ago – but it comes with enough quirks to give it the appearance of freshness. The Lincoln Lawyer (2011) ★★★☆☆ More4, 9.00pm He won acclaim for his role as enigmatic detective Rust Cohle in the TV series True Detective, but Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey stars here in the sort of courtroom drama for which he made his name. This time he’s Mick Haller, a slick LA defence lawyer who prefers to represent the guilty. However, a wealthy new client (Ryan Phillippe) prompts Haller to address his own past sins. Billy Liar (1963, b/w) ★★★☆☆ London Live, 12.00midnight Best known for Midnight Cowboy, for which he won three Oscars, John Schlesinger ranged from violent thrillers (Marathon Man) to romantic epics (Far from the Madding Crowd) to perceptive human studies (An Englishman Abroad), but he indicated the breadth of his ambitions with this gritty social drama featuring Tom Courtenay as an undertaker’s clerk with extravagant fantasies. Wednesday 10 January Sarah Lancashire Credit: Channel 4 Kiri Channel 4, 9.00pm Screenwriter Jack Thorne follows up the excellent National Treasure with another superbly cast, nimble and dark exploration of contemporary mores. Thorne’s careful research is all over this opening episode of four, yet it never feels didactic or clumsy. Kiri follows the investigation into the abduction of the titular black girl Kiri Akindele (Felicia Mukasa) by her birth family, just days before she is due to be adopted by her white foster family, headed up by Lia Williams and Steven Mackintosh. Sarah Lancashire plays Miriam Grayson, the social worker who allows Kiri’s ill-fated unsupervised visit. Lancashire picks her projects carefully, and this is a performance to rank alongside her Bafta-winning turn in Happy Valley: Miriam is an imperfect Samaritan, trying her best amid funding cuts, weak superiors and a dormant drink problem. From the moment that the girl disappears and director Euros Lyn’s colour palette darkens, the focus seems to be as much on apportioning blame as finding the missing girl. It’s a desperate situation shot through with guilt and human frailty, yet not without humour; another modern tragedy from a writer who specialises in them. Gabriel Tate The Truth About Looking Good BBC One, 8.00pm Cherry Healey and 25 volunteers and experts from the Universities of Sheffield and Sunderland join forces to separate scientific fact from marketing fiction in the £9 billion per annum industry of cosmetics, in particular weighing up the pros and cons of moisturisers and cellulite solutions. Britain’s Brightest Family ITV, 8.00pm Anne Hegerty – familiar as The Chase’s Governess – oversees a new quiz show in which family members must show off their own general knowledge and nominate relatives according to their perceived areas of expertise. A Stitch in Time BBC Four, 8.30pm This fascinating series finds fashion historian Amber Butchart displaying a variety of eye-catching headgear to scrutinise Jan van Eyck’s The Arnolfini Portrait for clues about its subjects and the 15th-century world that they inhabited. Couturier Ninya Mikhaila, meanwhile, recreates the green gown worn by the painting’s pregnant woman. Miriam’s Big American Adventure BBC One, 9.00pm; Scotland, 10.45pm Miriam Margolyes hits Middle America, where she encounters young Indiana summer campers pledging their allegiance, slightly older drug casualties in Ohio and survivalists of all ages in Tennessee. Fighting for Air BBC Two, 9.00pm Campaigning doctor and inescapable TV face Xand van Tulleken examines the grim effects of air pollution on the body, before travelling to Birmingham to bring clean air to one high street using a combination of technological expertise and community goodwill. GT England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm While dedicating three hours to just nine days of British history might seem like overkill, here it almost feels inadequate, such is the wealth of incident and intrigue in Dr Helen Castor’s series. This middle episode follows the five days that determined whether or not Lady Jane would survive on the throne. The reconstructions are decent and the CGI sparingly used; instead, Castor lets the experts do the talking in an engaging piece of narrative history, concluding tomorrow. GT Tunes of Glory (1960) ★★★☆☆ Movies4Men, 4.00pm British director Ronald Neame made some of the best-known films of the 20th century, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Poseidon Adventure, but this was his personal favourite. It focuses on personal rivalries within a fictional Highland regiment after the Second World War. John Mills plays a new, authoritarian CO, and Alec Guinness – cast against type – gives an exceptional performance as his lax, hard-drinking predecessor. JFK (1991) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.55pm Oliver Stone is in conspiracy-theorist mode for this film about the murder of President John F Kennedy. Whatever you make of Stone’s theory that the assassination was an FBI plot, lawyer Jim Garrison’s (Kevin Costner) showdown moment when he demonstrates that JFK was killed by multiple bullets is jaw-dropping. Costner, fresh from the Oscars glory of Dances with Wolves, is a magnetic lead. The Social Network (2010) ★★★★★ Channel 4, 1.10am Jesse Eisenberg is superb as the gauche cyber-geek who became a billionaire in his twenties in this dazzling dramatisation of the story of Facebook. It may necessarily be speculative in parts about Mark Zuckerberg and his invention, but this is a brilliantly scripted and absolutely gripping tale of clashing egos, precocious talent and betrayal. Justin Timberlake and Andrew Garfield also star. Thursday 11 January Cheetahs in Namibia Credit: BBC Big Cats BBC One, 8.00pm One family, 40 different faces. That’s how this beautifully shot three-part series about the planet’s top wild predator, the cat, begins – with a kaleidoscope of feline faces that perfectly illustrates the huge variety and essential similarity between the many different branches of the family. Not all of them are big. One, the rusty-spotted cat – a kittenish, ultra-rare inhabitant of Sri Lanka’s jungles – is so tiny when fully grown that it can fit in the palm of your hand. Although it makes up for its small stature with surprising ferocity. The series took two years and 30 separate filming expeditions to make, travelling to all four corners of the globe to show just how adaptable wild cats have evolved to be. In this opening edition we see not only relatively familiar sights such as cheetahs and lions chasing down water buffalo and giraffe in Africa, but also some rarities, such as a snow leopard searching the Himalayas for a mate. Plus, Siberian tigers and the elusive Canada lynx make appearances. There are surprises, too, in footage of jaguars taking on caiman in the waters of the Pantanal, and pumas hunting penguin on the freezing southern shores of Patagonia. Gerard O’Donovan European Tour Golf: The BMW SA Open Sky Sports Main Event, 8.00am Action from the opening day’s play at the City of Ekurhuleni in Gauteng, South Africa, where Graeme Storm was the winner last year. Having very nearly lost his tour card in 2016, the Englishman defeated Northern Irish star Rory McIlroy in a play-off to win his second title on the tour and his first since the 2007 Open de France. EastEnders BBC One, 7.30pm Mel Owen (Tamzin Outhwaite) returns to Albert Square after a 16-year absence. Last time around she married twice, burnt down a nightclub, was kidnapped and slept with her best friend’s husband. So the producers’ promise of an “incredible” storyline for her comeback is probably, uh, credible. The Cruise: Return to the Mediterranean ITV, 8.30pm More stories of life on the cruise ship Royal Princess. Tonight, with 5,000 passengers and crew aboard, bad weather prevents the cruise ship from docking. England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm The concluding part of Helen Castor’s fascinating account of England’s “nine-day queen” opens on the eighth day of her reign, with armies heading for Framlingham Castle where her Catholic rival for the throne, Mary Tudor, had assembled a powerful force. Within a day, 16-year-old Jane would be betrayed, abandoned and consigned to the Tower of London. But her legacy, according to Castor, was far greater than her brief time on the throne suggests. Transformation Street ITV, 9.00pm Wimpole Street, Marylebone, is home to the London Transgender Surgery, a private clinic catering for some of the estimated 130,000 Britons currently wishing to change gender. This revealing three-parter follows patients from initial consultations through to gender confirmation surgery. Walks with My Dog More4, 9.00pm The simple but engaging series in which celebrities take their four-legged friends for a trek through the UK’s more scenic parts makes a welcome return. This time Hadrian’s Wall, Norfolk and the Welsh mountains are among the destinations. Actress Caroline Quentin leads off tonight, taking her pooch for a stroll around the Helford estuary in Cornwall. GO Great Art ITV, 10.45pm In this second episode of the art series, Tim Marlow moves on to the 19th-century Parisian art collector Paul Durand-Ruel, whose financially risky landmark 1886 exhibition in New York thrust impressionism into the mainstream. Marlow examines his impact, and the lasting influence of Monet, Cézanne, Degas and Renoir. GO From Russia with Love (1963) ★★★★☆ ITV4, 9.00pm Ah, those were the days: the certainties of the Cold War, a beautiful Soviet defector and a chase across the Balkans. Will Spectre avenge the death of Dr No? No chance. Sean Connery was in the swing of things in his second outing as James Bond, pursued by two of 007’s best adversaries, in “Red” Grant (Robert Shaw) and Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya). Terence Young directs. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.15pm This superb adaptation of John le Carré’s brilliant, intricate Cold War spy novel is a triumph. The espionage drama follows the hunt for a Soviet double agent at the top of the British secret service, with Gary Oldman spearheading the excellent ensemble cast, which includes Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt and Benedict Cumberbatch. It’s funny, seductive and suspenseful. GoodFellas (1990) ★★★★★ ITV4, 11.25pm Martin Scorsese’s Mafia masterpiece, adapted from a non-fiction book, has all the qualities of great cinema: it’s thrilling, it’s provocative, it’s stylish, and it’s got a young Robert De Niro in it. Ray Liotta plays the youngster who longs to be a gangster; De Niro and Joe Pesci are in the Mob. Pesci’s mother, meanwhile, reportedly asked him if he had to swear quite so much – the f-word is used 300 times. Friday 12 January Revd Matthew Stafford, Revd Nicholas Lowton, Fr Matthew Cashmore and Revd Ruth Hulse Credit: BBC A Vicar’s Life BBC Two, 8.30pm This amiable new series follows several vicars in their parishes in the Diocese of Hereford, the most rural in the Church of England. It’s the standard heart-warming mixture of births, marriages and deaths – or as likeable Reverend Matthew Stafford, vicar at the village of Much Wenlock, says: “hatched, matched and dispatched” – but, for all that sense of familiarity, it’s well-made and very engaging. This opening episode sees Matthew officiate at a lovely local wedding, and Reverend Nicholas Lowton, the Rural Dean of Abbeydore and Vicar of the Black Mountains Group, deal with the theft of the parish registry books (“whoever did this has got lessons that they need to learn”). Elsewhere, Reverend Ruth Hulse, Team Vicar for West Hereford, organises a funeral for much-loved former churchwarden Barbara. “It’s a huge loss, like losing a member of your own family,” she says. Everyone involved comes out of it well, and Matthew manages to sneak a message in amid the jokes: “I don’t take myself seriously, but I do take God and what I do very seriously,” he notes. So do his parishioners, many of whom admit that he’s helped them see the church in a more favourable light. Sarah Hughes PGA Tour Golf: The Sony Open Sky Sports Main Event, 12.01am The opening day of the tournament at the Waialae CC in Honolulu, Hawaii, where Justin Thomas won the title last year. Room 101 BBC One, 8.30pm Frank Skinner returns with a new series of the long-running show. This opener promises to be a lot of fun given that his guests, Charlie Brooker, Scarlett Moffatt and Pearl Mackie, are not short of opinion. Among the objects up for inclusion in Room 101 are crocodiles, mosquitos and haircuts. Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm The second part of this food and art travelogue sees chef Giorgio Locatelli and art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon visit the Basilica di San Clemente, the Testaccio Slaughterhouse and the Palazzo Colonna. As before, a great deal of the fun comes from the way that each man learns from the other. David Bowie Evening BBC Four, from 9.00pm Two years after David Bowie’s death, BBC Four dedicates an evening to the rock great. First up is Francis Whately’s 2013 film David Bowie: Five Years in the Making of an Icon, which looks at key moments in his career. These include his time as Ziggy Stardust, his reinvention as the Thin White Duke, the making of 1977’s Heroes, and the global success of Let’s Dance. It’s followed by David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust, which looks at how Bowie created his most (in)famous alter ego. Lethal Weapon ITV, 9.00pm The rambunctious remake of the Danny Glover-Mel Gibson films roars back for a second series. It begins with an action-packed episode that sees Murtaugh (Damon Wayans) heading to Mexico to try to reign in partner Riggs (Clayne Crawford) who is still seeking vengeance for his wife’s death. Delicious Sky One, 9.00pm The second series of the foodie drama reaches its penultimate episode, and it’s the anniversary of philanderer Leo’s death, which the families plan to mark with a feast. Naturally, nothing goes smoothly – chef Gina (Dawn French) is pushed to the limits by her daughter Theresa’s (Tanya Reynolds) behaviour, while Gina’s love rival turned business partner Sam (Emilia Fox) takes out her anger on chef Adam (Aaron Anthony). SH The Graham Norton Show BBC One, 10.35pm Expect a super-smooth evening as Graham Norton is joined by A-listers Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, who discuss Steven Spielberg’s political drama The Post, but also share some good anecdotes amid all the mild ribbing. SH The Polka King (2017) Netflix, from today Exuberant Jack Black plays to his strengths in this biopic, based on the documentary The Man Who Would Be Polka King, about a flamboyant Polish émigré-turned-Polka King-turned-convicted Ponzi-scheme criminal. Despite being a film about a scoundrel who swindled senior citizens out of millions of dollars in order to achieve the American dream, it’s surprisingly entertaining, though a more serious consideration of con artists wouldn’t have gone amiss. The Frogmen (1951, b/w) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 4.35pm A pleasingly understated yet atmospheric war drama in which Richard Widmark stars as a tough Navy commander put in charge of a team of demolition divers on a South Pacific island. At first, the arrival of their superior goes down like a lead diving suit, but he soon wins them over by neutralising an undetonated torpedo. Due to the conditions being deemed too “riotous”, the female roles were written out. Get Out (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Get Out is one of the first films expressly to be set in a post-Obama era and is a breathlessly suspenseful exposé of the horror of liberal racism. Perfect, white Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) wants to allay the concerns of her boyfriend, black photographer Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), and invites him to meet her parents. They don’t bat an eyelid over his skin colour, but the film rattles with provocations. Television previewers Toby Dantzic, Catherine Gee, Simon Horsford, Sarah Hughes, Clive Morgan, Gerard O'Donovan, Vicki Power, Patrick Smith, Gabriel Tate and Rachel Ward

What's on TV tonight: Michael Palin: a Life on Screen and Dancing on Ice

Sunday 7 January Michael Palin: a Life on Screen BBC Two, 9.00pm Telling Michael Palin’s story from his birth to the film Death of Stalin (in which he played Minister Molotov), this profile of the “Nicest Man in Showbiz” is a pleasure from start to finish. First realising his talents in improvised shows for his school friends, Palin found kindred spirits and his comic mojo as part of the Oxford Revue at the Edinburgh Festival, eventually parlaying his skills as a jobbing writer and performer into a series that changed the comedy landscape forever: Monty Python’s Flying Circus was born after an apparently disastrous meeting ended with a BBC commissioner pronouncing sternly, “all right, I’ll give you 13 episodes. But that’s all!” While John Cleese provides the tongue-in-cheek venom (describing Palin as “a sociopath”), Connie Booth, David Jason and Armando Iannucci pay tribute to a versatile talent. An abundance of clips confirm that alongside the comic genius of Python and Ripping Yarns lay a serious actor of genuine heft (as seen in GBH and Brazil), the gifted travel journalist of Around the World in 80 Days and a successful and engaging diarist. Palin, too, chips in with observations and memories, all delivered with charismatic humility and self-deprecation. Gabriel Tate Into the Forest BBC Three, from 10.00am This uneven but intriguing Canadian indie film didn’t find much of an audience when it was released in 2015 but will be now shown online via BBC Three. Evan Rachel Wood (Westworld) and Ellen Page (Juno) star in this dystopian drama as Nell and Eva, two sisters living in a forest with their father in the near future. They find their isolated existence under threat when a district-wide power cut sparks anarchy and increasing desperation in the nearby town. FA Cup Football: Shrewsbury Town v West Ham United BBC One, 1.40pm More potential giant-killing in the FA Cup, as League One side Shrewsbury Town try to cut down West Ham at Montgomery Waters Meadow. The visitors have won the FA Cup three times but haven’t lifted the trophy since 1980, when they beat Arsenal 1-0, thanks to a goal by Trevor Brooking. Shrewsbury made it through to the third round by beating against Aldershot Town and Morecambe. Premiership Rugby Union: Wasps v Saracens BT Sport 1, 2.30pm Having beaten Bath 31-26 at the Rec last weekend, Wasps look to continue their fine form in the new year at home to second-placed Saracens. The away side will be full of confidence, though: they capped off an impressive 2017 with a 46-31 victory over Worcester Warriors, with Jackson Wray and Nathan Earle both scoring try doubles as Saracens ran in six tries at Allianz Park. When these sides last met here, a hat-trick from Thomas Young helped Wasps to a 35-15 victory. A repeat performance here will see them leapfrog Saracens in the table. Dancing on Ice ITV, 6.00pm Back after a four-year absence, Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean return with Dancing on Ice, but they are no longer coaches. They are now be assessing the ice-skating abilities of a dozen celebrities, including Bucks Fizz alumna Cheryl Baker and Great British Bake Off 2016 champion Candice Brown. Joe Cocker Night Sky Arts, from 6.45pm One of the finest of all the white blues and soul shouters, Joe Cocker’s gargling, howling delivery was most famously captured in his performance of With a Little Help from My Friends at Woodstock. This double bill begins with the concert film Fire It Up: Live, and Cocker performing in Cologne on his final tour before his death in 2014. John Edginton’s biographical documentary, Mad Dog with Soul, follows at 9.00pm. GT Attenborough and the Sea Dragon BBC One, 8.00pm David Attenborough pursues his lifelong passion of fossilology on Britain’s Jurassic Coast. The 200-million-year-old bones of an Ichthyosaur must be dug out of the Dorset cliffs, analysed and finally recreated using computer technology. Vera ITV, 8.00pm The eighth series of the murder mystery begins with DCI Vera Stanhope (the excellent Brenda Blethyn) investigating how a respected fraud officer came to be incinerated in an abbatoir. Her enquiries lead her into a close-knit fishing community and clashes with her fellow coppers. The Biggest Little Railway in the World Channel 4, 8.00pm In this extraordinary venture, Dick Strawbridge and a team of fellow enthusiasts attempt to build a model railway to stretch 71 miles from Fort William to Inverness. The project will require viaducts, bridges and even a miniature ferry, all documented over the next five weeks. GT And Now for Something Completely Different (1971) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 10.00pm; N Ireland, 11.30pm Fans of Monty Python’s Flying Circus rejoice – this compilation film is a feast of the comedians’ favourite sketches from the first two TV series. With John Cleese introducing a number of scenes with: “And now, for something completely different”, it’s a fun trip into the archives, including as the “dead parrot” sketch. Captain Phillips (2013) ★★★★☆ ITV, 10.10pm Paul Greengrass (United 93 and three Bourne films) has a rare gift for working with action-thriller material and making something cohesive, layered and complex from it. With this account of Somali pirates boarding an American cargo ship and kidnapping its captain (Tom Hanks), he remains at the top of his game. Hanks may be the big draw, but it’s the pirates who impress, especially Bafta-winning Barkhad Abdi. Stations of the Cross (2015) ★★★☆☆ BBC Four, 11.00pm This cold, preachy German film from director Dietrich Brüggemann plays out over 14 single-shot scenes, each titled after a station of the cross on Christ’s walk to Calvary and to mirror the restrictions of religious fundamentalism. Its story, about a 14-year-old girl who pursues the ideals of Christian self-sacrifice to terrifying extremes, won the best script gong at the Berlin International Film Festival. Monday 8 January Archie Panjabi Credit: ITV Next of Kin ITV, 9.00pm Written by Indian Summers creator Paul Rutman and partner Natasha Narayan, this atmospheric six-part thriller has a fine cast and gets off to an instantly intriguing start. Emmy-winner Archie Panjabi is a smart and sympathetic presence as British-Pakistani doctor Mona Harcourt, who, together with her well-connected political lobbyist husband Guy (Jack Davenport) and wider family, is preparing to celebrate the return from Lahore of her beloved brother Kareem (Navin Chowdhry). His failure to arrive as expected on the day a terrorist incident in London results in four deaths, and brings the city to a standstill. It sets in motion a series of terrifying consequences – the most disturbing of which is the sudden intense interest in the family of the anti-terrorism unit of the Metropolitan Police. It is a credible, and in parts distressing, depiction of what it is like to be an ordinary British Muslim in the wake of such an attack, especially when it emerges that the real focus of the police investigation is not Kareem, but his 18-year-old student son Danny (Viveik Kalra) who had been becoming increasingly isolated from the family in the weeks before the attack. Gerard O’Donovan Star Trek: Discovery Netflix, from today Following an eight-week break, the latest incarnation of the Star Trek franchise returns to complete its debut run. The previous episode ended on a twist that saw the USS Discovery cast out into unchartered space. Unsurprisingly, this 10th episode picks up with Captain Lorca (Jason Isaacs) and crew facing a raft of previously unimagined threats in their eventful efforts to find a way home. How to Lose Weight Well Channel 4, 8.00pm Dr Xand van Tulleken and dietician Hala El-Shafie take a new approach to diet testing, dividing a group of volunteers into three categories: crashers (short-term diets), shape shifters (six-week programmes) and life changers (four-month plans) to see which of the current popular diets are most effective. Silent Witness BBC One, 9.00pm The enduringly popular pathologists-playing-cops drama kicks off its 21st series with a typically slow burn two-parter. As Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) struggles to get over her Mexican ordeal, a close friend (Emma Fielding) goes missing. Surgeons: At the Edge of Life BBC Two, 9.00pm Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham’s busy surgical unit is the focus of this new series following surgeons, theatre staff and patients through operations at the cutting edge of medicine. In the first edition, maxillofacial surgeons tackle a marathon operation on a 53-year-old diagnosed with a major facial tumour. My Astonishing Self: Gabriel Byrne on George Bernard Shaw BBC Four, 9.00pm An actor’s homage to a playwright becomes a fascinating exploration of the life and work of a literary Titan of the early 20th century.George Bernard Shaw was a pioneering socialist, feminist and philosopher as well as the writer of hugely popular plays such as Pygmalion. Here, Gabriel Byrne assesses the character and legacy of a man whose intelligence, charm and social conscience, and ingenuity for self-promotion, propelled him to global renown. GO The Undateables Channel 4, 9.00pm A fresh crop of singletons looking for love includes a rugby-playing chef from Hull with Tourette’s, a bookseller from Cambridgeshire with Asperger’s, and a photography graduate from London with scoliosis. GO Gallipoli (1981) ★★★★★ Film4, 6.35pm Director Peter Weir’s tale of war and friendship in 1915 – one of his very finest films – reaches a devastating finale in the clash between Australians and Turks on the shore of the Dardanelles. Mel Gibson’s race through the trenches with a crucial message – ignore the last order! – is more pulse-quickening than a dozen Bravehearts. You pray for him to beat that whistle every time. Harold Hopkins also stars. Life of Pi (2012) ★★★★★ E4, 8.00pm Ang Lee’s warm, wise and wondrous adventure story, adapted from Yann Martel’s 2002 Booker Prize-winning novel, follows Pi (Suraj Sharma), shipwrecked in the South Pacific with Richard Parker, a Bengal tiger named after the hunter who captured him. Its kaleidoscopic imagery is some of the most advanced ever, but the story unfolds with such simplicity and clarity that it could almost be a silent movie. Logan (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Hugh Jackman’s third – and best – lone outing for his whiskery mutant Wolverine. You might assume James Mangold’s film, set in the near future, where a weary Logan meets a young mutant much like himself, is meant as a sequel to the two other Wolverine movies, but watching it, you’re struck by the thought that this paranoid, violent noir western is the real, shotgun-toting deal. Tuesday 9 January Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Credit: AFP House of Saud: A Family at War BBC Two, 9.00pm This detailed three-part series on the ruling family of Saudi Arabia makes for unmissable if terrifying television. Dispensing with any sort of Adam Curtis-style frills, the opening film simply talks us through the House of Saud’s involvement in recent history, from Sarajevo to Syria. Hearing from intelligence analysts and long-time Saudi observers, it builds a complicated picture of the uneasy relationship between the Saudi royal family and Wahhabism, the particular strain of Islam they promote. It’s a story that encompasses a small hamlet in Bosnia, a family home in India, weapons dealt from Bulgaria to Afghanistan and online films watched all over the world. Much is made of the new Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and his desire for reform (“It’s not a question of how important he is to this – he is this,” announces one observer) but it remains hard to judge just how much of his actions are driven by genuine belief and how much constitute a power grab. Ultimately what lingers is not the political revelations, interesting though they are, but the interviews with the blinded of Syria, the wounded of Iraq, the devastated of Bosnia: the countless casualties of the geopolitical game. Sarah Hughes England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm Tudor England might seem like a subject that has been covered so much that there is nothing new to be said about it. But hold on to those gripes because Helen Castor’s detailed look at the nine-day reign of Lady Jane Grey is an invigorating, intelligent take on the period. Using a wide range of old documents and interesting voices, Castor guides us through Jane’s brief, unlucky life, examining how she ended up as a pawn between two powerful factions and why it was that she found herself raised from relative obscurity to the dizzying heights of the English throne. School for Stammerers ITV, 9.00pm Speech impediments can be devastating to live with, as this thoughtful film, which follows six people living with a stammer, demonstrates. One solution on offer is the intensive McGuire Programme, a residential course that promises life-changing results albeit under tough conditions. 24 Hours in A&E Channel 4, 9.00pm The fly-on-the-wall medical series continues with this week’s patients including Marie, who arrives by ambulance at St George’s Hospital having collapsed at home with an unexplained headache. The Blacklist Sky One, 9.00pm The ludicrous and yet strangely enjoyable US spy series continues with James Spader’s slick Red this week setting his sights on wealthy art thief Greyson Blaise (Owain Yeoman). While Red gallivants abroad Tom (Ryan Eggold) seeks help to identify the bones in the suitcase. SH Inside No 9 BBC Two, 10.00pm This melancholy tale in the excellent comedy anthology is of rivalry and friendship lost. Reece Shearsmith is Tommy, who grumpily agrees to perform with former stand-up partner Len (Steve Pemberton), 30 years after they split in mysterious circumstances. Working Class White Men Channel 4, 10.00pm Rapper Professor Green has been quietly making a name for himself as a film-maker and this fascinating film about white working-class men is one of the week’s highlights. Green’s tense meeting with Britain First will garner the headlines but there is hope here too, with Lewis, the teenage would-be mathematician, the show’s highlight. SH The Fault in Our Stars (2014) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 9.00pm Josh Boone’s film, adapted from the phenomenally successful young-adult novel, about two American teenagers both diagnosed with cancer is wisely observed and tenderly performed, most notably by Shailene Woodley. The basic storyline is so worn it’s close to threadbare – Love Story told it more than 40 years ago – but it comes with enough quirks to give it the appearance of freshness. The Lincoln Lawyer (2011) ★★★☆☆ More4, 9.00pm He won acclaim for his role as enigmatic detective Rust Cohle in the TV series True Detective, but Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey stars here in the sort of courtroom drama for which he made his name. This time he’s Mick Haller, a slick LA defence lawyer who prefers to represent the guilty. However, a wealthy new client (Ryan Phillippe) prompts Haller to address his own past sins. Billy Liar (1963, b/w) ★★★☆☆ London Live, 12.00midnight Best known for Midnight Cowboy, for which he won three Oscars, John Schlesinger ranged from violent thrillers (Marathon Man) to romantic epics (Far from the Madding Crowd) to perceptive human studies (An Englishman Abroad), but he indicated the breadth of his ambitions with this gritty social drama featuring Tom Courtenay as an undertaker’s clerk with extravagant fantasies. Wednesday 10 January Sarah Lancashire Credit: Channel 4 Kiri Channel 4, 9.00pm Screenwriter Jack Thorne follows up the excellent National Treasure with another superbly cast, nimble and dark exploration of contemporary mores. Thorne’s careful research is all over this opening episode of four, yet it never feels didactic or clumsy. Kiri follows the investigation into the abduction of the titular black girl Kiri Akindele (Felicia Mukasa) by her birth family, just days before she is due to be adopted by her white foster family, headed up by Lia Williams and Steven Mackintosh. Sarah Lancashire plays Miriam Grayson, the social worker who allows Kiri’s ill-fated unsupervised visit. Lancashire picks her projects carefully, and this is a performance to rank alongside her Bafta-winning turn in Happy Valley: Miriam is an imperfect Samaritan, trying her best amid funding cuts, weak superiors and a dormant drink problem. From the moment that the girl disappears and director Euros Lyn’s colour palette darkens, the focus seems to be as much on apportioning blame as finding the missing girl. It’s a desperate situation shot through with guilt and human frailty, yet not without humour; another modern tragedy from a writer who specialises in them. Gabriel Tate The Truth About Looking Good BBC One, 8.00pm Cherry Healey and 25 volunteers and experts from the Universities of Sheffield and Sunderland join forces to separate scientific fact from marketing fiction in the £9 billion per annum industry of cosmetics, in particular weighing up the pros and cons of moisturisers and cellulite solutions. Britain’s Brightest Family ITV, 8.00pm Anne Hegerty – familiar as The Chase’s Governess – oversees a new quiz show in which family members must show off their own general knowledge and nominate relatives according to their perceived areas of expertise. A Stitch in Time BBC Four, 8.30pm This fascinating series finds fashion historian Amber Butchart displaying a variety of eye-catching headgear to scrutinise Jan van Eyck’s The Arnolfini Portrait for clues about its subjects and the 15th-century world that they inhabited. Couturier Ninya Mikhaila, meanwhile, recreates the green gown worn by the painting’s pregnant woman. Miriam’s Big American Adventure BBC One, 9.00pm; Scotland, 10.45pm Miriam Margolyes hits Middle America, where she encounters young Indiana summer campers pledging their allegiance, slightly older drug casualties in Ohio and survivalists of all ages in Tennessee. Fighting for Air BBC Two, 9.00pm Campaigning doctor and inescapable TV face Xand van Tulleken examines the grim effects of air pollution on the body, before travelling to Birmingham to bring clean air to one high street using a combination of technological expertise and community goodwill. GT England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm While dedicating three hours to just nine days of British history might seem like overkill, here it almost feels inadequate, such is the wealth of incident and intrigue in Dr Helen Castor’s series. This middle episode follows the five days that determined whether or not Lady Jane would survive on the throne. The reconstructions are decent and the CGI sparingly used; instead, Castor lets the experts do the talking in an engaging piece of narrative history, concluding tomorrow. GT Tunes of Glory (1960) ★★★☆☆ Movies4Men, 4.00pm British director Ronald Neame made some of the best-known films of the 20th century, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Poseidon Adventure, but this was his personal favourite. It focuses on personal rivalries within a fictional Highland regiment after the Second World War. John Mills plays a new, authoritarian CO, and Alec Guinness – cast against type – gives an exceptional performance as his lax, hard-drinking predecessor. JFK (1991) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.55pm Oliver Stone is in conspiracy-theorist mode for this film about the murder of President John F Kennedy. Whatever you make of Stone’s theory that the assassination was an FBI plot, lawyer Jim Garrison’s (Kevin Costner) showdown moment when he demonstrates that JFK was killed by multiple bullets is jaw-dropping. Costner, fresh from the Oscars glory of Dances with Wolves, is a magnetic lead. The Social Network (2010) ★★★★★ Channel 4, 1.10am Jesse Eisenberg is superb as the gauche cyber-geek who became a billionaire in his twenties in this dazzling dramatisation of the story of Facebook. It may necessarily be speculative in parts about Mark Zuckerberg and his invention, but this is a brilliantly scripted and absolutely gripping tale of clashing egos, precocious talent and betrayal. Justin Timberlake and Andrew Garfield also star. Thursday 11 January Cheetahs in Namibia Credit: BBC Big Cats BBC One, 8.00pm One family, 40 different faces. That’s how this beautifully shot three-part series about the planet’s top wild predator, the cat, begins – with a kaleidoscope of feline faces that perfectly illustrates the huge variety and essential similarity between the many different branches of the family. Not all of them are big. One, the rusty-spotted cat – a kittenish, ultra-rare inhabitant of Sri Lanka’s jungles – is so tiny when fully grown that it can fit in the palm of your hand. Although it makes up for its small stature with surprising ferocity. The series took two years and 30 separate filming expeditions to make, travelling to all four corners of the globe to show just how adaptable wild cats have evolved to be. In this opening edition we see not only relatively familiar sights such as cheetahs and lions chasing down water buffalo and giraffe in Africa, but also some rarities, such as a snow leopard searching the Himalayas for a mate. Plus, Siberian tigers and the elusive Canada lynx make appearances. There are surprises, too, in footage of jaguars taking on caiman in the waters of the Pantanal, and pumas hunting penguin on the freezing southern shores of Patagonia. Gerard O’Donovan European Tour Golf: The BMW SA Open Sky Sports Main Event, 8.00am Action from the opening day’s play at the City of Ekurhuleni in Gauteng, South Africa, where Graeme Storm was the winner last year. Having very nearly lost his tour card in 2016, the Englishman defeated Northern Irish star Rory McIlroy in a play-off to win his second title on the tour and his first since the 2007 Open de France. EastEnders BBC One, 7.30pm Mel Owen (Tamzin Outhwaite) returns to Albert Square after a 16-year absence. Last time around she married twice, burnt down a nightclub, was kidnapped and slept with her best friend’s husband. So the producers’ promise of an “incredible” storyline for her comeback is probably, uh, credible. The Cruise: Return to the Mediterranean ITV, 8.30pm More stories of life on the cruise ship Royal Princess. Tonight, with 5,000 passengers and crew aboard, bad weather prevents the cruise ship from docking. England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm The concluding part of Helen Castor’s fascinating account of England’s “nine-day queen” opens on the eighth day of her reign, with armies heading for Framlingham Castle where her Catholic rival for the throne, Mary Tudor, had assembled a powerful force. Within a day, 16-year-old Jane would be betrayed, abandoned and consigned to the Tower of London. But her legacy, according to Castor, was far greater than her brief time on the throne suggests. Transformation Street ITV, 9.00pm Wimpole Street, Marylebone, is home to the London Transgender Surgery, a private clinic catering for some of the estimated 130,000 Britons currently wishing to change gender. This revealing three-parter follows patients from initial consultations through to gender confirmation surgery. Walks with My Dog More4, 9.00pm The simple but engaging series in which celebrities take their four-legged friends for a trek through the UK’s more scenic parts makes a welcome return. This time Hadrian’s Wall, Norfolk and the Welsh mountains are among the destinations. Actress Caroline Quentin leads off tonight, taking her pooch for a stroll around the Helford estuary in Cornwall. GO Great Art ITV, 10.45pm In this second episode of the art series, Tim Marlow moves on to the 19th-century Parisian art collector Paul Durand-Ruel, whose financially risky landmark 1886 exhibition in New York thrust impressionism into the mainstream. Marlow examines his impact, and the lasting influence of Monet, Cézanne, Degas and Renoir. GO From Russia with Love (1963) ★★★★☆ ITV4, 9.00pm Ah, those were the days: the certainties of the Cold War, a beautiful Soviet defector and a chase across the Balkans. Will Spectre avenge the death of Dr No? No chance. Sean Connery was in the swing of things in his second outing as James Bond, pursued by two of 007’s best adversaries, in “Red” Grant (Robert Shaw) and Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya). Terence Young directs. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.15pm This superb adaptation of John le Carré’s brilliant, intricate Cold War spy novel is a triumph. The espionage drama follows the hunt for a Soviet double agent at the top of the British secret service, with Gary Oldman spearheading the excellent ensemble cast, which includes Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt and Benedict Cumberbatch. It’s funny, seductive and suspenseful. GoodFellas (1990) ★★★★★ ITV4, 11.25pm Martin Scorsese’s Mafia masterpiece, adapted from a non-fiction book, has all the qualities of great cinema: it’s thrilling, it’s provocative, it’s stylish, and it’s got a young Robert De Niro in it. Ray Liotta plays the youngster who longs to be a gangster; De Niro and Joe Pesci are in the Mob. Pesci’s mother, meanwhile, reportedly asked him if he had to swear quite so much – the f-word is used 300 times. Friday 12 January Revd Matthew Stafford, Revd Nicholas Lowton, Fr Matthew Cashmore and Revd Ruth Hulse Credit: BBC A Vicar’s Life BBC Two, 8.30pm This amiable new series follows several vicars in their parishes in the Diocese of Hereford, the most rural in the Church of England. It’s the standard heart-warming mixture of births, marriages and deaths – or as likeable Reverend Matthew Stafford, vicar at the village of Much Wenlock, says: “hatched, matched and dispatched” – but, for all that sense of familiarity, it’s well-made and very engaging. This opening episode sees Matthew officiate at a lovely local wedding, and Reverend Nicholas Lowton, the Rural Dean of Abbeydore and Vicar of the Black Mountains Group, deal with the theft of the parish registry books (“whoever did this has got lessons that they need to learn”). Elsewhere, Reverend Ruth Hulse, Team Vicar for West Hereford, organises a funeral for much-loved former churchwarden Barbara. “It’s a huge loss, like losing a member of your own family,” she says. Everyone involved comes out of it well, and Matthew manages to sneak a message in amid the jokes: “I don’t take myself seriously, but I do take God and what I do very seriously,” he notes. So do his parishioners, many of whom admit that he’s helped them see the church in a more favourable light. Sarah Hughes PGA Tour Golf: The Sony Open Sky Sports Main Event, 12.01am The opening day of the tournament at the Waialae CC in Honolulu, Hawaii, where Justin Thomas won the title last year. Room 101 BBC One, 8.30pm Frank Skinner returns with a new series of the long-running show. This opener promises to be a lot of fun given that his guests, Charlie Brooker, Scarlett Moffatt and Pearl Mackie, are not short of opinion. Among the objects up for inclusion in Room 101 are crocodiles, mosquitos and haircuts. Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm The second part of this food and art travelogue sees chef Giorgio Locatelli and art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon visit the Basilica di San Clemente, the Testaccio Slaughterhouse and the Palazzo Colonna. As before, a great deal of the fun comes from the way that each man learns from the other. David Bowie Evening BBC Four, from 9.00pm Two years after David Bowie’s death, BBC Four dedicates an evening to the rock great. First up is Francis Whately’s 2013 film David Bowie: Five Years in the Making of an Icon, which looks at key moments in his career. These include his time as Ziggy Stardust, his reinvention as the Thin White Duke, the making of 1977’s Heroes, and the global success of Let’s Dance. It’s followed by David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust, which looks at how Bowie created his most (in)famous alter ego. Lethal Weapon ITV, 9.00pm The rambunctious remake of the Danny Glover-Mel Gibson films roars back for a second series. It begins with an action-packed episode that sees Murtaugh (Damon Wayans) heading to Mexico to try to reign in partner Riggs (Clayne Crawford) who is still seeking vengeance for his wife’s death. Delicious Sky One, 9.00pm The second series of the foodie drama reaches its penultimate episode, and it’s the anniversary of philanderer Leo’s death, which the families plan to mark with a feast. Naturally, nothing goes smoothly – chef Gina (Dawn French) is pushed to the limits by her daughter Theresa’s (Tanya Reynolds) behaviour, while Gina’s love rival turned business partner Sam (Emilia Fox) takes out her anger on chef Adam (Aaron Anthony). SH The Graham Norton Show BBC One, 10.35pm Expect a super-smooth evening as Graham Norton is joined by A-listers Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, who discuss Steven Spielberg’s political drama The Post, but also share some good anecdotes amid all the mild ribbing. SH The Polka King (2017) Netflix, from today Exuberant Jack Black plays to his strengths in this biopic, based on the documentary The Man Who Would Be Polka King, about a flamboyant Polish émigré-turned-Polka King-turned-convicted Ponzi-scheme criminal. Despite being a film about a scoundrel who swindled senior citizens out of millions of dollars in order to achieve the American dream, it’s surprisingly entertaining, though a more serious consideration of con artists wouldn’t have gone amiss. The Frogmen (1951, b/w) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 4.35pm A pleasingly understated yet atmospheric war drama in which Richard Widmark stars as a tough Navy commander put in charge of a team of demolition divers on a South Pacific island. At first, the arrival of their superior goes down like a lead diving suit, but he soon wins them over by neutralising an undetonated torpedo. Due to the conditions being deemed too “riotous”, the female roles were written out. Get Out (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Get Out is one of the first films expressly to be set in a post-Obama era and is a breathlessly suspenseful exposé of the horror of liberal racism. Perfect, white Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) wants to allay the concerns of her boyfriend, black photographer Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), and invites him to meet her parents. They don’t bat an eyelid over his skin colour, but the film rattles with provocations. Television previewers Toby Dantzic, Catherine Gee, Simon Horsford, Sarah Hughes, Clive Morgan, Gerard O'Donovan, Vicki Power, Patrick Smith, Gabriel Tate and Rachel Ward

What's on TV tonight: Hard Sun and Wedding Day Winners

Saturday 6 January Hard Sun BBC One, 9.35pm The BBC launches into 2018 with this hard-boiled crime drama from Luther creator Neil Cross. It seems like a standard police procedural at first. Slick detective Charlie Hicks (Jim Sturgess) is paired up with an inscrutable new colleague, Elaine Renko (Agyness Deyn), and they head off to investigate an apparent suicide. Quickly, however, both the case and characters gather complexity. For a start, the main players have enticing back stories: Hicks is involved in a sensitive extramarital dalliance, whilst Renko is psychologically bruised from a recent violent break-in at her home. Equally intriguing, however, is the sci-fi-inspired twist that the investigation takes. We learn that behind the suicide lies an exchange of top-secret information confirming the destruction of the world in five years time. Goofy though this sounds, it gives undeniable tension to the episode as shadowy forces close in on our duo, and nicely sets things up for further thrills should news of the apocalypse break out. Sturgess and Deyn have enough chemistry to convince, and London, at its most relentlessly urban here, provides a bleakly atmospheric backdrop. Toby Dantzic FA Cup Football: Fleetwood Town v Leicester City BBC One, 12.45pm How’s this for a David-versus-Goliath affair, as League One’s Fleetwood Town take on the 2016 Premier League winners at Highbury Stadium? The Leicester have made it to the FA Cup final on four occasions but have never won the competition. The last time they appeared in the final, in April 1969, they lost 1-0 to Manchester City. Darts: BDO Lakeside World Professional Championships Channel 4, 12.45pm Coverage of the opening day of the tournament staged at Lakeside Country Club in Frimley Green, featuring matches in the first round of the men’s and ladies’ competitions. Forty men and 16 women from 17 countries do battle for the coveted prizes, won last year by Glen Durrant and Lisa Ashton. This afternoon, three-time Lakeside champion Martin “Wolfie” Adams takes on the number two seed Mark “Gladiator” McGeeney, before Ashton starts the defence of her title against Wales’s Rhian Griffiths. Hugh’s Wild West BBC Two, 6.15pm; Northern Ireland, 7.45pm Eco-friendly chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall takes us on a nature trail through his beloved West Country for this new series. He starts in the Wye Valley, “one of nature’s secret gardens”, where he introduces us to the Dipper, Britain’s only aquatic songbird. Wedding Day Winners BBC One, 7.25pm Lorraine Kelly and Rob Beckett host this new nuptial-themed Saturday night entertainment show. Two couples, along with their friends and families, compete in a series of challenges to win a televised wedding and lavish honeymoon. The Voice UK ITV, 8.00pm After just one series, last year’s new coach Gavin Rossdale is out nd in comes X Factor success story Olly Murs, as the singing contest begins its staggering seventh run. Emma Willis returns as the host, as the blind auditions get under way. Spiral BBC Four, 9.00pm and 10.00pm One of the first shows to pique our interest in European crime drama, this much-admired French series returned last week for its sixth outing. The discovery of a torso in a suitcase prompted tough police captain Laure Berthaud (Caroline Proust) to return from her maternity leave. This week, Berthaud and partner Lt Escoffier (Thierry Godard) grill two brothers who they believe have links to the deceased, and lawyer Joséphine Karlsson (Audrey Fleurot) pushes her client to plead guilty. Freddie Mercury: The Great Pretender Sky Arts, 9.00pm Rhys Thomas’s 2012 documentary explores Queen singer Freddie Mercury’s attempt to forge a solo career in the Eighties. The insights from his peers and the concert footage are compelling, but it’s the previously unseen interviews with and snippets of his collaborations with the likes of Michael Jackson that prove revelatory. TD Feud: Bette and Joan BBC Two, 9.15pm and 10.00pm Delightfully camp but moving all the same, Ryan Murphy’s dramatisation of this great Hollywood rivalry concludes with one last double bill. Joan Crawford (Jessica Lange) becomes increasingly riled by Bette Davis (Susan Sarandon), as the latter interferes with her performance on their latest film collaboration, Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte. TD West Side Story (1961) ★★★★★ Channel 5, 11.40am The vertiginous energy and heart make this one of the greatest musicals. Jerome Robbins’s inspired choreography needs the biggest screen it can get; when the film’s firing on all cylinders of music, lyrics and motion, there’s little to touch it. Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer are lovers from opposite sides of the tracks, while Leonard Bernstein’s heady score perfectly aids their battle. The Letter (1940, b/w) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 3.00pm By 1940, Bette Davis was the biggest star. She’d just won her second Oscar for Jezebel, giving a performance that typified women of the era – wild, wilful, destructive, bitchy. But in William Wyler’s film noir, based on W Somerset Maugham’s short story, she careened towards tragedy with self-annihilating abandon. Davis plays Leslie, who kills a man in self defence, but an incriminating letter casts doubt on her story. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 (2015) ★★★★☆ Channel 4, 9.00pm Jennifer Lawrence and Philip Seymour Hoffman – in his last film – end the Hunger Games series with an electrifying, high-stakes final showdown. In addition to the two leads, Part 2 groans with the collective talents of Donald Sutherland, Julianne Moore and Woody Harrelson as vengeful modern heroine Katniss (Lawrence) prepares to win the war. Sunday 7 January Michael Palin Credit: BBC Michael Palin: a Life on Screen BBC Two, 9.00pm Telling Michael Palin’s story from his birth to the film Death of Stalin (in which he played Minister Molotov), this profile of the “Nicest Man in Showbiz” is a pleasure from start to finish. First realising his talents in improvised shows for his school friends, Palin found kindred spirits and his comic mojo as part of the Oxford Revue at the Edinburgh Festival, eventually parlaying his skills as a jobbing writer and performer into a series that changed the comedy landscape forever: Monty Python’s Flying Circus was born after an apparently disastrous meeting ended with a BBC commissioner pronouncing sternly, “all right, I’ll give you 13 episodes. But that’s all!” While John Cleese provides the tongue-in-cheek venom (describing Palin as “a sociopath”), Connie Booth, David Jason and Armando Iannucci pay tribute to a versatile talent. An abundance of clips confirm that alongside the comic genius of Python and Ripping Yarns lay a serious actor of genuine heft (as seen in GBH and Brazil), the gifted travel journalist of Around the World in 80 Days and a successful and engaging diarist. Palin, too, chips in with observations and memories, all delivered with charismatic humility and self-deprecation. Gabriel Tate Into the Forest BBC Three, from 10.00am This uneven but intriguing Canadian indie film didn’t find much of an audience when it was released in 2015 but will be now shown online via BBC Three. Evan Rachel Wood (Westworld) and Ellen Page (Juno) star in this dystopian drama as Nell and Eva, two sisters living in a forest with their father in the near future. They find their isolated existence under threat when a district-wide power cut sparks anarchy and increasing desperation in the nearby town. FA Cup Football: Shrewsbury Town v West Ham United BBC One, 1.40pm More potential giant-killing in the FA Cup, as League One side Shrewsbury Town try to cut down West Ham at Montgomery Waters Meadow. The visitors have won the FA Cup three times but haven’t lifted the trophy since 1980, when they beat Arsenal 1-0, thanks to a goal by Trevor Brooking. Shrewsbury made it through to the third round by beating against Aldershot Town and Morecambe. Premiership Rugby Union: Wasps v Saracens BT Sport 1, 2.30pm Having beaten Bath 31-26 at the Rec last weekend, Wasps look to continue their fine form in the new year at home to second-placed Saracens. The away side will be full of confidence, though: they capped off an impressive 2017 with a 46-31 victory over Worcester Warriors, with Jackson Wray and Nathan Earle both scoring try doubles as Saracens ran in six tries at Allianz Park. When these sides last met here, a hat-trick from Thomas Young helped Wasps to a 35-15 victory. A repeat performance here will see them leapfrog Saracens in the table. Dancing on Ice ITV, 6.00pm Back after a four-year absence, Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean return with Dancing on Ice, but they are no longer coaches. They are now be assessing the ice-skating abilities of a dozen celebrities, including Bucks Fizz alumna Cheryl Baker and Great British Bake Off 2016 champion Candice Brown. Joe Cocker Night Sky Arts, from 6.45pm One of the finest of all the white blues and soul shouters, Joe Cocker’s gargling, howling delivery was most famously captured in his performance of With a Little Help from My Friends at Woodstock. This double bill begins with the concert film Fire It Up: Live, and Cocker performing in Cologne on his final tour before his death in 2014. John Edginton’s biographical documentary, Mad Dog with Soul, follows at 9.00pm. GT Attenborough and the Sea Dragon BBC One, 8.00pm David Attenborough pursues his lifelong passion of fossilology on Britain’s Jurassic Coast. The 200-million-year-old bones of an Ichthyosaur must be dug out of the Dorset cliffs, analysed and finally recreated using computer technology. Vera ITV, 8.00pm The eighth series of the murder mystery begins with DCI Vera Stanhope (the excellent Brenda Blethyn) investigating how a respected fraud officer came to be incinerated in an abbatoir. Her enquiries lead her into a close-knit fishing community and clashes with her fellow coppers. The Biggest Little Railway in the World Channel 4, 8.00pm In this extraordinary venture, Dick Strawbridge and a team of fellow enthusiasts attempt to build a model railway to stretch 71 miles from Fort William to Inverness. The project will require viaducts, bridges and even a miniature ferry, all documented over the next five weeks. GT And Now for Something Completely Different (1971) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 10.00pm; N Ireland, 11.30pm Fans of Monty Python’s Flying Circus rejoice – this compilation film is a feast of the comedians’ favourite sketches from the first two TV series. With John Cleese introducing a number of scenes with: “And now, for something completely different”, it’s a fun trip into the archives, including as the “dead parrot” sketch. Captain Phillips (2013) ★★★★☆ ITV, 10.10pm Paul Greengrass (United 93 and three Bourne films) has a rare gift for working with action-thriller material and making something cohesive, layered and complex from it. With this account of Somali pirates boarding an American cargo ship and kidnapping its captain (Tom Hanks), he remains at the top of his game. Hanks may be the big draw, but it’s the pirates who impress, especially Bafta-winning Barkhad Abdi. Stations of the Cross (2015) ★★★☆☆ BBC Four, 11.00pm This cold, preachy German film from director Dietrich Brüggemann plays out over 14 single-shot scenes, each titled after a station of the cross on Christ’s walk to Calvary and to mirror the restrictions of religious fundamentalism. Its story, about a 14-year-old girl who pursues the ideals of Christian self-sacrifice to terrifying extremes, won the best script gong at the Berlin International Film Festival. Monday 8 January Archie Panjabi Credit: ITV Next of Kin ITV, 9.00pm Written by Indian Summers creator Paul Rutman and partner Natasha Narayan, this atmospheric six-part thriller has a fine cast and gets off to an instantly intriguing start. Emmy-winner Archie Panjabi is a smart and sympathetic presence as British-Pakistani doctor Mona Harcourt, who, together with her well-connected political lobbyist husband Guy (Jack Davenport) and wider family, is preparing to celebrate the return from Lahore of her beloved brother Kareem (Navin Chowdhry). His failure to arrive as expected on the day a terrorist incident in London results in four deaths, and brings the city to a standstill. It sets in motion a series of terrifying consequences – the most disturbing of which is the sudden intense interest in the family of the anti-terrorism unit of the Metropolitan Police. It is a credible, and in parts distressing, depiction of what it is like to be an ordinary British Muslim in the wake of such an attack, especially when it emerges that the real focus of the police investigation is not Kareem, but his 18-year-old student son Danny (Viveik Kalra) who had been becoming increasingly isolated from the family in the weeks before the attack. Gerard O’Donovan Star Trek: Discovery Netflix, from today Following an eight-week break, the latest incarnation of the Star Trek franchise returns to complete its debut run. The previous episode ended on a twist that saw the USS Discovery cast out into unchartered space. Unsurprisingly, this 10th episode picks up with Captain Lorca (Jason Isaacs) and crew facing a raft of previously unimagined threats in their eventful efforts to find a way home. How to Lose Weight Well Channel 4, 8.00pm Dr Xand van Tulleken and dietician Hala El-Shafie take a new approach to diet testing, dividing a group of volunteers into three categories: crashers (short-term diets), shape shifters (six-week programmes) and life changers (four-month plans) to see which of the current popular diets are most effective. Silent Witness BBC One, 9.00pm The enduringly popular pathologists-playing-cops drama kicks off its 21st series with a typically slow burn two-parter. As Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) struggles to get over her Mexican ordeal, a close friend (Emma Fielding) goes missing. Surgeons: At the Edge of Life BBC Two, 9.00pm Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham’s busy surgical unit is the focus of this new series following surgeons, theatre staff and patients through operations at the cutting edge of medicine. In the first edition, maxillofacial surgeons tackle a marathon operation on a 53-year-old diagnosed with a major facial tumour. My Astonishing Self: Gabriel Byrne on George Bernard Shaw BBC Four, 9.00pm An actor’s homage to a playwright becomes a fascinating exploration of the life and work of a literary Titan of the early 20th century.George Bernard Shaw was a pioneering socialist, feminist and philosopher as well as the writer of hugely popular plays such as Pygmalion. Here, Gabriel Byrne assesses the character and legacy of a man whose intelligence, charm and social conscience, and ingenuity for self-promotion, propelled him to global renown. GO The Undateables Channel 4, 9.00pm A fresh crop of singletons looking for love includes a rugby-playing chef from Hull with Tourette’s, a bookseller from Cambridgeshire with Asperger’s, and a photography graduate from London with scoliosis. GO Gallipoli (1981) ★★★★★ Film4, 6.35pm Director Peter Weir’s tale of war and friendship in 1915 – one of his very finest films – reaches a devastating finale in the clash between Australians and Turks on the shore of the Dardanelles. Mel Gibson’s race through the trenches with a crucial message – ignore the last order! – is more pulse-quickening than a dozen Bravehearts. You pray for him to beat that whistle every time. Harold Hopkins also stars. Life of Pi (2012) ★★★★★ E4, 8.00pm Ang Lee’s warm, wise and wondrous adventure story, adapted from Yann Martel’s 2002 Booker Prize-winning novel, follows Pi (Suraj Sharma), shipwrecked in the South Pacific with Richard Parker, a Bengal tiger named after the hunter who captured him. Its kaleidoscopic imagery is some of the most advanced ever, but the story unfolds with such simplicity and clarity that it could almost be a silent movie. Logan (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Hugh Jackman’s third – and best – lone outing for his whiskery mutant Wolverine. You might assume James Mangold’s film, set in the near future, where a weary Logan meets a young mutant much like himself, is meant as a sequel to the two other Wolverine movies, but watching it, you’re struck by the thought that this paranoid, violent noir western is the real, shotgun-toting deal. Tuesday 9 January Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Credit: AFP House of Saud: A Family at War BBC Two, 9.00pm This detailed three-part series on the ruling family of Saudi Arabia makes for unmissable if terrifying television. Dispensing with any sort of Adam Curtis-style frills, the opening film simply talks us through the House of Saud’s involvement in recent history, from Sarajevo to Syria. Hearing from intelligence analysts and long-time Saudi observers, it builds a complicated picture of the uneasy relationship between the Saudi royal family and Wahhabism, the particular strain of Islam they promote. It’s a story that encompasses a small hamlet in Bosnia, a family home in India, weapons dealt from Bulgaria to Afghanistan and online films watched all over the world. Much is made of the new Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and his desire for reform (“It’s not a question of how important he is to this – he is this,” announces one observer) but it remains hard to judge just how much of his actions are driven by genuine belief and how much constitute a power grab. Ultimately what lingers is not the political revelations, interesting though they are, but the interviews with the blinded of Syria, the wounded of Iraq, the devastated of Bosnia: the countless casualties of the geopolitical game. Sarah Hughes England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm Tudor England might seem like a subject that has been covered so much that there is nothing new to be said about it. But hold on to those gripes because Helen Castor’s detailed look at the nine-day reign of Lady Jane Grey is an invigorating, intelligent take on the period. Using a wide range of old documents and interesting voices, Castor guides us through Jane’s brief, unlucky life, examining how she ended up as a pawn between two powerful factions and why it was that she found herself raised from relative obscurity to the dizzying heights of the English throne. School for Stammerers ITV, 9.00pm Speech impediments can be devastating to live with, as this thoughtful film, which follows six people living with a stammer, demonstrates. One solution on offer is the intensive McGuire Programme, a residential course that promises life-changing results albeit under tough conditions. 24 Hours in A&E Channel 4, 9.00pm The fly-on-the-wall medical series continues with this week’s patients including Marie, who arrives by ambulance at St George’s Hospital having collapsed at home with an unexplained headache. The Blacklist Sky One, 9.00pm The ludicrous and yet strangely enjoyable US spy series continues with James Spader’s slick Red this week setting his sights on wealthy art thief Greyson Blaise (Owain Yeoman). While Red gallivants abroad Tom (Ryan Eggold) seeks help to identify the bones in the suitcase. SH Inside No 9 BBC Two, 10.00pm This melancholy tale in the excellent comedy anthology is of rivalry and friendship lost. Reece Shearsmith is Tommy, who grumpily agrees to perform with former stand-up partner Len (Steve Pemberton), 30 years after they split in mysterious circumstances. Working Class White Men Channel 4, 10.00pm Rapper Professor Green has been quietly making a name for himself as a film-maker and this fascinating film about white working-class men is one of the week’s highlights. Green’s tense meeting with Britain First will garner the headlines but there is hope here too, with Lewis, the teenage would-be mathematician, the show’s highlight. SH The Fault in Our Stars (2014) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 9.00pm Josh Boone’s film, adapted from the phenomenally successful young-adult novel, about two American teenagers both diagnosed with cancer is wisely observed and tenderly performed, most notably by Shailene Woodley. The basic storyline is so worn it’s close to threadbare – Love Story told it more than 40 years ago – but it comes with enough quirks to give it the appearance of freshness. The Lincoln Lawyer (2011) ★★★☆☆ More4, 9.00pm He won acclaim for his role as enigmatic detective Rust Cohle in the TV series True Detective, but Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey stars here in the sort of courtroom drama for which he made his name. This time he’s Mick Haller, a slick LA defence lawyer who prefers to represent the guilty. However, a wealthy new client (Ryan Phillippe) prompts Haller to address his own past sins. Billy Liar (1963, b/w) ★★★☆☆ London Live, 12.00midnight Best known for Midnight Cowboy, for which he won three Oscars, John Schlesinger ranged from violent thrillers (Marathon Man) to romantic epics (Far from the Madding Crowd) to perceptive human studies (An Englishman Abroad), but he indicated the breadth of his ambitions with this gritty social drama featuring Tom Courtenay as an undertaker’s clerk with extravagant fantasies. Wednesday 10 January Sarah Lancashire Credit: Channel 4 Kiri Channel 4, 9.00pm Screenwriter Jack Thorne follows up the excellent National Treasure with another superbly cast, nimble and dark exploration of contemporary mores. Thorne’s careful research is all over this opening episode of four, yet it never feels didactic or clumsy. Kiri follows the investigation into the abduction of the titular black girl Kiri Akindele (Felicia Mukasa) by her birth family, just days before she is due to be adopted by her white foster family, headed up by Lia Williams and Steven Mackintosh. Sarah Lancashire plays Miriam Grayson, the social worker who allows Kiri’s ill-fated unsupervised visit. Lancashire picks her projects carefully, and this is a performance to rank alongside her Bafta-winning turn in Happy Valley: Miriam is an imperfect Samaritan, trying her best amid funding cuts, weak superiors and a dormant drink problem. From the moment that the girl disappears and director Euros Lyn’s colour palette darkens, the focus seems to be as much on apportioning blame as finding the missing girl. It’s a desperate situation shot through with guilt and human frailty, yet not without humour; another modern tragedy from a writer who specialises in them. Gabriel Tate The Truth About Looking Good BBC One, 8.00pm Cherry Healey and 25 volunteers and experts from the Universities of Sheffield and Sunderland join forces to separate scientific fact from marketing fiction in the £9 billion per annum industry of cosmetics, in particular weighing up the pros and cons of moisturisers and cellulite solutions. Britain’s Brightest Family ITV, 8.00pm Anne Hegerty – familiar as The Chase’s Governess – oversees a new quiz show in which family members must show off their own general knowledge and nominate relatives according to their perceived areas of expertise. A Stitch in Time BBC Four, 8.30pm This fascinating series finds fashion historian Amber Butchart displaying a variety of eye-catching headgear to scrutinise Jan van Eyck’s The Arnolfini Portrait for clues about its subjects and the 15th-century world that they inhabited. Couturier Ninya Mikhaila, meanwhile, recreates the green gown worn by the painting’s pregnant woman. Miriam’s Big American Adventure BBC One, 9.00pm; Scotland, 10.45pm Miriam Margolyes hits Middle America, where she encounters young Indiana summer campers pledging their allegiance, slightly older drug casualties in Ohio and survivalists of all ages in Tennessee. Fighting for Air BBC Two, 9.00pm Campaigning doctor and inescapable TV face Xand van Tulleken examines the grim effects of air pollution on the body, before travelling to Birmingham to bring clean air to one high street using a combination of technological expertise and community goodwill. GT England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm While dedicating three hours to just nine days of British history might seem like overkill, here it almost feels inadequate, such is the wealth of incident and intrigue in Dr Helen Castor’s series. This middle episode follows the five days that determined whether or not Lady Jane would survive on the throne. The reconstructions are decent and the CGI sparingly used; instead, Castor lets the experts do the talking in an engaging piece of narrative history, concluding tomorrow. GT Tunes of Glory (1960) ★★★☆☆ Movies4Men, 4.00pm British director Ronald Neame made some of the best-known films of the 20th century, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Poseidon Adventure, but this was his personal favourite. It focuses on personal rivalries within a fictional Highland regiment after the Second World War. John Mills plays a new, authoritarian CO, and Alec Guinness – cast against type – gives an exceptional performance as his lax, hard-drinking predecessor. JFK (1991) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.55pm Oliver Stone is in conspiracy-theorist mode for this film about the murder of President John F Kennedy. Whatever you make of Stone’s theory that the assassination was an FBI plot, lawyer Jim Garrison’s (Kevin Costner) showdown moment when he demonstrates that JFK was killed by multiple bullets is jaw-dropping. Costner, fresh from the Oscars glory of Dances with Wolves, is a magnetic lead. The Social Network (2010) ★★★★★ Channel 4, 1.10am Jesse Eisenberg is superb as the gauche cyber-geek who became a billionaire in his twenties in this dazzling dramatisation of the story of Facebook. It may necessarily be speculative in parts about Mark Zuckerberg and his invention, but this is a brilliantly scripted and absolutely gripping tale of clashing egos, precocious talent and betrayal. Justin Timberlake and Andrew Garfield also star. Thursday 11 January Cheetahs in Namibia Credit: BBC Big Cats BBC One, 8.00pm One family, 40 different faces. That’s how this beautifully shot three-part series about the planet’s top wild predator, the cat, begins – with a kaleidoscope of feline faces that perfectly illustrates the huge variety and essential similarity between the many different branches of the family. Not all of them are big. One, the rusty-spotted cat – a kittenish, ultra-rare inhabitant of Sri Lanka’s jungles – is so tiny when fully grown that it can fit in the palm of your hand. Although it makes up for its small stature with surprising ferocity. The series took two years and 30 separate filming expeditions to make, travelling to all four corners of the globe to show just how adaptable wild cats have evolved to be. In this opening edition we see not only relatively familiar sights such as cheetahs and lions chasing down water buffalo and giraffe in Africa, but also some rarities, such as a snow leopard searching the Himalayas for a mate. Plus, Siberian tigers and the elusive Canada lynx make appearances. There are surprises, too, in footage of jaguars taking on caiman in the waters of the Pantanal, and pumas hunting penguin on the freezing southern shores of Patagonia. Gerard O’Donovan European Tour Golf: The BMW SA Open Sky Sports Main Event, 8.00am Action from the opening day’s play at the City of Ekurhuleni in Gauteng, South Africa, where Graeme Storm was the winner last year. Having very nearly lost his tour card in 2016, the Englishman defeated Northern Irish star Rory McIlroy in a play-off to win his second title on the tour and his first since the 2007 Open de France. EastEnders BBC One, 7.30pm Mel Owen (Tamzin Outhwaite) returns to Albert Square after a 16-year absence. Last time around she married twice, burnt down a nightclub, was kidnapped and slept with her best friend’s husband. So the producers’ promise of an “incredible” storyline for her comeback is probably, uh, credible. The Cruise: Return to the Mediterranean ITV, 8.30pm More stories of life on the cruise ship Royal Princess. Tonight, with 5,000 passengers and crew aboard, bad weather prevents the cruise ship from docking. England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm The concluding part of Helen Castor’s fascinating account of England’s “nine-day queen” opens on the eighth day of her reign, with armies heading for Framlingham Castle where her Catholic rival for the throne, Mary Tudor, had assembled a powerful force. Within a day, 16-year-old Jane would be betrayed, abandoned and consigned to the Tower of London. But her legacy, according to Castor, was far greater than her brief time on the throne suggests. Transformation Street ITV, 9.00pm Wimpole Street, Marylebone, is home to the London Transgender Surgery, a private clinic catering for some of the estimated 130,000 Britons currently wishing to change gender. This revealing three-parter follows patients from initial consultations through to gender confirmation surgery. Walks with My Dog More4, 9.00pm The simple but engaging series in which celebrities take their four-legged friends for a trek through the UK’s more scenic parts makes a welcome return. This time Hadrian’s Wall, Norfolk and the Welsh mountains are among the destinations. Actress Caroline Quentin leads off tonight, taking her pooch for a stroll around the Helford estuary in Cornwall. GO Great Art ITV, 10.45pm In this second episode of the art series, Tim Marlow moves on to the 19th-century Parisian art collector Paul Durand-Ruel, whose financially risky landmark 1886 exhibition in New York thrust impressionism into the mainstream. Marlow examines his impact, and the lasting influence of Monet, Cézanne, Degas and Renoir. GO From Russia with Love (1963) ★★★★☆ ITV4, 9.00pm Ah, those were the days: the certainties of the Cold War, a beautiful Soviet defector and a chase across the Balkans. Will Spectre avenge the death of Dr No? No chance. Sean Connery was in the swing of things in his second outing as James Bond, pursued by two of 007’s best adversaries, in “Red” Grant (Robert Shaw) and Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya). Terence Young directs. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.15pm This superb adaptation of John le Carré’s brilliant, intricate Cold War spy novel is a triumph. The espionage drama follows the hunt for a Soviet double agent at the top of the British secret service, with Gary Oldman spearheading the excellent ensemble cast, which includes Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt and Benedict Cumberbatch. It’s funny, seductive and suspenseful. GoodFellas (1990) ★★★★★ ITV4, 11.25pm Martin Scorsese’s Mafia masterpiece, adapted from a non-fiction book, has all the qualities of great cinema: it’s thrilling, it’s provocative, it’s stylish, and it’s got a young Robert De Niro in it. Ray Liotta plays the youngster who longs to be a gangster; De Niro and Joe Pesci are in the Mob. Pesci’s mother, meanwhile, reportedly asked him if he had to swear quite so much – the f-word is used 300 times. Friday 12 January Revd Matthew Stafford, Revd Nicholas Lowton, Fr Matthew Cashmore and Revd Ruth Hulse Credit: BBC A Vicar’s Life BBC Two, 8.30pm This amiable new series follows several vicars in their parishes in the Diocese of Hereford, the most rural in the Church of England. It’s the standard heart-warming mixture of births, marriages and deaths – or as likeable Reverend Matthew Stafford, vicar at the village of Much Wenlock, says: “hatched, matched and dispatched” – but, for all that sense of familiarity, it’s well-made and very engaging. This opening episode sees Matthew officiate at a lovely local wedding, and Reverend Nicholas Lowton, the Rural Dean of Abbeydore and Vicar of the Black Mountains Group, deal with the theft of the parish registry books (“whoever did this has got lessons that they need to learn”). Elsewhere, Reverend Ruth Hulse, Team Vicar for West Hereford, organises a funeral for much-loved former churchwarden Barbara. “It’s a huge loss, like losing a member of your own family,” she says. Everyone involved comes out of it well, and Matthew manages to sneak a message in amid the jokes: “I don’t take myself seriously, but I do take God and what I do very seriously,” he notes. So do his parishioners, many of whom admit that he’s helped them see the church in a more favourable light. Sarah Hughes PGA Tour Golf: The Sony Open Sky Sports Main Event, 12.01am The opening day of the tournament at the Waialae CC in Honolulu, Hawaii, where Justin Thomas won the title last year. Room 101 BBC One, 8.30pm Frank Skinner returns with a new series of the long-running show. This opener promises to be a lot of fun given that his guests, Charlie Brooker, Scarlett Moffatt and Pearl Mackie, are not short of opinion. Among the objects up for inclusion in Room 101 are crocodiles, mosquitos and haircuts. Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm The second part of this food and art travelogue sees chef Giorgio Locatelli and art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon visit the Basilica di San Clemente, the Testaccio Slaughterhouse and the Palazzo Colonna. As before, a great deal of the fun comes from the way that each man learns from the other. David Bowie Evening BBC Four, from 9.00pm Two years after David Bowie’s death, BBC Four dedicates an evening to the rock great. First up is Francis Whately’s 2013 film David Bowie: Five Years in the Making of an Icon, which looks at key moments in his career. These include his time as Ziggy Stardust, his reinvention as the Thin White Duke, the making of 1977’s Heroes, and the global success of Let’s Dance. It’s followed by David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust, which looks at how Bowie created his most (in)famous alter ego. Lethal Weapon ITV, 9.00pm The rambunctious remake of the Danny Glover-Mel Gibson films roars back for a second series. It begins with an action-packed episode that sees Murtaugh (Damon Wayans) heading to Mexico to try to reign in partner Riggs (Clayne Crawford) who is still seeking vengeance for his wife’s death. Delicious Sky One, 9.00pm The second series of the foodie drama reaches its penultimate episode, and it’s the anniversary of philanderer Leo’s death, which the families plan to mark with a feast. Naturally, nothing goes smoothly – chef Gina (Dawn French) is pushed to the limits by her daughter Theresa’s (Tanya Reynolds) behaviour, while Gina’s love rival turned business partner Sam (Emilia Fox) takes out her anger on chef Adam (Aaron Anthony). SH The Graham Norton Show BBC One, 10.35pm Expect a super-smooth evening as Graham Norton is joined by A-listers Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, who discuss Steven Spielberg’s political drama The Post, but also share some good anecdotes amid all the mild ribbing. SH The Polka King (2017) Netflix, from today Exuberant Jack Black plays to his strengths in this biopic, based on the documentary The Man Who Would Be Polka King, about a flamboyant Polish émigré-turned-Polka King-turned-convicted Ponzi-scheme criminal. Despite being a film about a scoundrel who swindled senior citizens out of millions of dollars in order to achieve the American dream, it’s surprisingly entertaining, though a more serious consideration of con artists wouldn’t have gone amiss. The Frogmen (1951, b/w) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 4.35pm A pleasingly understated yet atmospheric war drama in which Richard Widmark stars as a tough Navy commander put in charge of a team of demolition divers on a South Pacific island. At first, the arrival of their superior goes down like a lead diving suit, but he soon wins them over by neutralising an undetonated torpedo. Due to the conditions being deemed too “riotous”, the female roles were written out. Get Out (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Get Out is one of the first films expressly to be set in a post-Obama era and is a breathlessly suspenseful exposé of the horror of liberal racism. Perfect, white Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) wants to allay the concerns of her boyfriend, black photographer Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), and invites him to meet her parents. They don’t bat an eyelid over his skin colour, but the film rattles with provocations. Television previewers Toby Dantzic, Catherine Gee, Simon Horsford, Sarah Hughes, Clive Morgan, Gerard O'Donovan, Vicki Power, Patrick Smith, Gabriel Tate and Rachel Ward

What's on TV tonight: Hard Sun and Wedding Day Winners

Saturday 6 January Hard Sun BBC One, 9.35pm The BBC launches into 2018 with this hard-boiled crime drama from Luther creator Neil Cross. It seems like a standard police procedural at first. Slick detective Charlie Hicks (Jim Sturgess) is paired up with an inscrutable new colleague, Elaine Renko (Agyness Deyn), and they head off to investigate an apparent suicide. Quickly, however, both the case and characters gather complexity. For a start, the main players have enticing back stories: Hicks is involved in a sensitive extramarital dalliance, whilst Renko is psychologically bruised from a recent violent break-in at her home. Equally intriguing, however, is the sci-fi-inspired twist that the investigation takes. We learn that behind the suicide lies an exchange of top-secret information confirming the destruction of the world in five years time. Goofy though this sounds, it gives undeniable tension to the episode as shadowy forces close in on our duo, and nicely sets things up for further thrills should news of the apocalypse break out. Sturgess and Deyn have enough chemistry to convince, and London, at its most relentlessly urban here, provides a bleakly atmospheric backdrop. Toby Dantzic FA Cup Football: Fleetwood Town v Leicester City BBC One, 12.45pm How’s this for a David-versus-Goliath affair, as League One’s Fleetwood Town take on the 2016 Premier League winners at Highbury Stadium? The Leicester have made it to the FA Cup final on four occasions but have never won the competition. The last time they appeared in the final, in April 1969, they lost 1-0 to Manchester City. Darts: BDO Lakeside World Professional Championships Channel 4, 12.45pm Coverage of the opening day of the tournament staged at Lakeside Country Club in Frimley Green, featuring matches in the first round of the men’s and ladies’ competitions. Forty men and 16 women from 17 countries do battle for the coveted prizes, won last year by Glen Durrant and Lisa Ashton. This afternoon, three-time Lakeside champion Martin “Wolfie” Adams takes on the number two seed Mark “Gladiator” McGeeney, before Ashton starts the defence of her title against Wales’s Rhian Griffiths. Hugh’s Wild West BBC Two, 6.15pm; Northern Ireland, 7.45pm Eco-friendly chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall takes us on a nature trail through his beloved West Country for this new series. He starts in the Wye Valley, “one of nature’s secret gardens”, where he introduces us to the Dipper, Britain’s only aquatic songbird. Wedding Day Winners BBC One, 7.25pm Lorraine Kelly and Rob Beckett host this new nuptial-themed Saturday night entertainment show. Two couples, along with their friends and families, compete in a series of challenges to win a televised wedding and lavish honeymoon. The Voice UK ITV, 8.00pm After just one series, last year’s new coach Gavin Rossdale is out nd in comes X Factor success story Olly Murs, as the singing contest begins its staggering seventh run. Emma Willis returns as the host, as the blind auditions get under way. Spiral BBC Four, 9.00pm and 10.00pm One of the first shows to pique our interest in European crime drama, this much-admired French series returned last week for its sixth outing. The discovery of a torso in a suitcase prompted tough police captain Laure Berthaud (Caroline Proust) to return from her maternity leave. This week, Berthaud and partner Lt Escoffier (Thierry Godard) grill two brothers who they believe have links to the deceased, and lawyer Joséphine Karlsson (Audrey Fleurot) pushes her client to plead guilty. Freddie Mercury: The Great Pretender Sky Arts, 9.00pm Rhys Thomas’s 2012 documentary explores Queen singer Freddie Mercury’s attempt to forge a solo career in the Eighties. The insights from his peers and the concert footage are compelling, but it’s the previously unseen interviews with and snippets of his collaborations with the likes of Michael Jackson that prove revelatory. TD Feud: Bette and Joan BBC Two, 9.15pm and 10.00pm Delightfully camp but moving all the same, Ryan Murphy’s dramatisation of this great Hollywood rivalry concludes with one last double bill. Joan Crawford (Jessica Lange) becomes increasingly riled by Bette Davis (Susan Sarandon), as the latter interferes with her performance on their latest film collaboration, Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte. TD West Side Story (1961) ★★★★★ Channel 5, 11.40am The vertiginous energy and heart make this one of the greatest musicals. Jerome Robbins’s inspired choreography needs the biggest screen it can get; when the film’s firing on all cylinders of music, lyrics and motion, there’s little to touch it. Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer are lovers from opposite sides of the tracks, while Leonard Bernstein’s heady score perfectly aids their battle. The Letter (1940, b/w) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 3.00pm By 1940, Bette Davis was the biggest star. She’d just won her second Oscar for Jezebel, giving a performance that typified women of the era – wild, wilful, destructive, bitchy. But in William Wyler’s film noir, based on W Somerset Maugham’s short story, she careened towards tragedy with self-annihilating abandon. Davis plays Leslie, who kills a man in self defence, but an incriminating letter casts doubt on her story. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 (2015) ★★★★☆ Channel 4, 9.00pm Jennifer Lawrence and Philip Seymour Hoffman – in his last film – end the Hunger Games series with an electrifying, high-stakes final showdown. In addition to the two leads, Part 2 groans with the collective talents of Donald Sutherland, Julianne Moore and Woody Harrelson as vengeful modern heroine Katniss (Lawrence) prepares to win the war. Sunday 7 January Michael Palin Credit: BBC Michael Palin: a Life on Screen BBC Two, 9.00pm Telling Michael Palin’s story from his birth to the film Death of Stalin (in which he played Minister Molotov), this profile of the “Nicest Man in Showbiz” is a pleasure from start to finish. First realising his talents in improvised shows for his school friends, Palin found kindred spirits and his comic mojo as part of the Oxford Revue at the Edinburgh Festival, eventually parlaying his skills as a jobbing writer and performer into a series that changed the comedy landscape forever: Monty Python’s Flying Circus was born after an apparently disastrous meeting ended with a BBC commissioner pronouncing sternly, “all right, I’ll give you 13 episodes. But that’s all!” While John Cleese provides the tongue-in-cheek venom (describing Palin as “a sociopath”), Connie Booth, David Jason and Armando Iannucci pay tribute to a versatile talent. An abundance of clips confirm that alongside the comic genius of Python and Ripping Yarns lay a serious actor of genuine heft (as seen in GBH and Brazil), the gifted travel journalist of Around the World in 80 Days and a successful and engaging diarist. Palin, too, chips in with observations and memories, all delivered with charismatic humility and self-deprecation. Gabriel Tate Into the Forest BBC Three, from 10.00am This uneven but intriguing Canadian indie film didn’t find much of an audience when it was released in 2015 but will be now shown online via BBC Three. Evan Rachel Wood (Westworld) and Ellen Page (Juno) star in this dystopian drama as Nell and Eva, two sisters living in a forest with their father in the near future. They find their isolated existence under threat when a district-wide power cut sparks anarchy and increasing desperation in the nearby town. FA Cup Football: Shrewsbury Town v West Ham United BBC One, 1.40pm More potential giant-killing in the FA Cup, as League One side Shrewsbury Town try to cut down West Ham at Montgomery Waters Meadow. The visitors have won the FA Cup three times but haven’t lifted the trophy since 1980, when they beat Arsenal 1-0, thanks to a goal by Trevor Brooking. Shrewsbury made it through to the third round by beating against Aldershot Town and Morecambe. Premiership Rugby Union: Wasps v Saracens BT Sport 1, 2.30pm Having beaten Bath 31-26 at the Rec last weekend, Wasps look to continue their fine form in the new year at home to second-placed Saracens. The away side will be full of confidence, though: they capped off an impressive 2017 with a 46-31 victory over Worcester Warriors, with Jackson Wray and Nathan Earle both scoring try doubles as Saracens ran in six tries at Allianz Park. When these sides last met here, a hat-trick from Thomas Young helped Wasps to a 35-15 victory. A repeat performance here will see them leapfrog Saracens in the table. Dancing on Ice ITV, 6.00pm Back after a four-year absence, Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean return with Dancing on Ice, but they are no longer coaches. They are now be assessing the ice-skating abilities of a dozen celebrities, including Bucks Fizz alumna Cheryl Baker and Great British Bake Off 2016 champion Candice Brown. Joe Cocker Night Sky Arts, from 6.45pm One of the finest of all the white blues and soul shouters, Joe Cocker’s gargling, howling delivery was most famously captured in his performance of With a Little Help from My Friends at Woodstock. This double bill begins with the concert film Fire It Up: Live, and Cocker performing in Cologne on his final tour before his death in 2014. John Edginton’s biographical documentary, Mad Dog with Soul, follows at 9.00pm. GT Attenborough and the Sea Dragon BBC One, 8.00pm David Attenborough pursues his lifelong passion of fossilology on Britain’s Jurassic Coast. The 200-million-year-old bones of an Ichthyosaur must be dug out of the Dorset cliffs, analysed and finally recreated using computer technology. Vera ITV, 8.00pm The eighth series of the murder mystery begins with DCI Vera Stanhope (the excellent Brenda Blethyn) investigating how a respected fraud officer came to be incinerated in an abbatoir. Her enquiries lead her into a close-knit fishing community and clashes with her fellow coppers. The Biggest Little Railway in the World Channel 4, 8.00pm In this extraordinary venture, Dick Strawbridge and a team of fellow enthusiasts attempt to build a model railway to stretch 71 miles from Fort William to Inverness. The project will require viaducts, bridges and even a miniature ferry, all documented over the next five weeks. GT And Now for Something Completely Different (1971) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 10.00pm; N Ireland, 11.30pm Fans of Monty Python’s Flying Circus rejoice – this compilation film is a feast of the comedians’ favourite sketches from the first two TV series. With John Cleese introducing a number of scenes with: “And now, for something completely different”, it’s a fun trip into the archives, including as the “dead parrot” sketch. Captain Phillips (2013) ★★★★☆ ITV, 10.10pm Paul Greengrass (United 93 and three Bourne films) has a rare gift for working with action-thriller material and making something cohesive, layered and complex from it. With this account of Somali pirates boarding an American cargo ship and kidnapping its captain (Tom Hanks), he remains at the top of his game. Hanks may be the big draw, but it’s the pirates who impress, especially Bafta-winning Barkhad Abdi. Stations of the Cross (2015) ★★★☆☆ BBC Four, 11.00pm This cold, preachy German film from director Dietrich Brüggemann plays out over 14 single-shot scenes, each titled after a station of the cross on Christ’s walk to Calvary and to mirror the restrictions of religious fundamentalism. Its story, about a 14-year-old girl who pursues the ideals of Christian self-sacrifice to terrifying extremes, won the best script gong at the Berlin International Film Festival. Monday 8 January Archie Panjabi Credit: ITV Next of Kin ITV, 9.00pm Written by Indian Summers creator Paul Rutman and partner Natasha Narayan, this atmospheric six-part thriller has a fine cast and gets off to an instantly intriguing start. Emmy-winner Archie Panjabi is a smart and sympathetic presence as British-Pakistani doctor Mona Harcourt, who, together with her well-connected political lobbyist husband Guy (Jack Davenport) and wider family, is preparing to celebrate the return from Lahore of her beloved brother Kareem (Navin Chowdhry). His failure to arrive as expected on the day a terrorist incident in London results in four deaths, and brings the city to a standstill. It sets in motion a series of terrifying consequences – the most disturbing of which is the sudden intense interest in the family of the anti-terrorism unit of the Metropolitan Police. It is a credible, and in parts distressing, depiction of what it is like to be an ordinary British Muslim in the wake of such an attack, especially when it emerges that the real focus of the police investigation is not Kareem, but his 18-year-old student son Danny (Viveik Kalra) who had been becoming increasingly isolated from the family in the weeks before the attack. Gerard O’Donovan Star Trek: Discovery Netflix, from today Following an eight-week break, the latest incarnation of the Star Trek franchise returns to complete its debut run. The previous episode ended on a twist that saw the USS Discovery cast out into unchartered space. Unsurprisingly, this 10th episode picks up with Captain Lorca (Jason Isaacs) and crew facing a raft of previously unimagined threats in their eventful efforts to find a way home. How to Lose Weight Well Channel 4, 8.00pm Dr Xand van Tulleken and dietician Hala El-Shafie take a new approach to diet testing, dividing a group of volunteers into three categories: crashers (short-term diets), shape shifters (six-week programmes) and life changers (four-month plans) to see which of the current popular diets are most effective. Silent Witness BBC One, 9.00pm The enduringly popular pathologists-playing-cops drama kicks off its 21st series with a typically slow burn two-parter. As Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) struggles to get over her Mexican ordeal, a close friend (Emma Fielding) goes missing. Surgeons: At the Edge of Life BBC Two, 9.00pm Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham’s busy surgical unit is the focus of this new series following surgeons, theatre staff and patients through operations at the cutting edge of medicine. In the first edition, maxillofacial surgeons tackle a marathon operation on a 53-year-old diagnosed with a major facial tumour. My Astonishing Self: Gabriel Byrne on George Bernard Shaw BBC Four, 9.00pm An actor’s homage to a playwright becomes a fascinating exploration of the life and work of a literary Titan of the early 20th century.George Bernard Shaw was a pioneering socialist, feminist and philosopher as well as the writer of hugely popular plays such as Pygmalion. Here, Gabriel Byrne assesses the character and legacy of a man whose intelligence, charm and social conscience, and ingenuity for self-promotion, propelled him to global renown. GO The Undateables Channel 4, 9.00pm A fresh crop of singletons looking for love includes a rugby-playing chef from Hull with Tourette’s, a bookseller from Cambridgeshire with Asperger’s, and a photography graduate from London with scoliosis. GO Gallipoli (1981) ★★★★★ Film4, 6.35pm Director Peter Weir’s tale of war and friendship in 1915 – one of his very finest films – reaches a devastating finale in the clash between Australians and Turks on the shore of the Dardanelles. Mel Gibson’s race through the trenches with a crucial message – ignore the last order! – is more pulse-quickening than a dozen Bravehearts. You pray for him to beat that whistle every time. Harold Hopkins also stars. Life of Pi (2012) ★★★★★ E4, 8.00pm Ang Lee’s warm, wise and wondrous adventure story, adapted from Yann Martel’s 2002 Booker Prize-winning novel, follows Pi (Suraj Sharma), shipwrecked in the South Pacific with Richard Parker, a Bengal tiger named after the hunter who captured him. Its kaleidoscopic imagery is some of the most advanced ever, but the story unfolds with such simplicity and clarity that it could almost be a silent movie. Logan (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Hugh Jackman’s third – and best – lone outing for his whiskery mutant Wolverine. You might assume James Mangold’s film, set in the near future, where a weary Logan meets a young mutant much like himself, is meant as a sequel to the two other Wolverine movies, but watching it, you’re struck by the thought that this paranoid, violent noir western is the real, shotgun-toting deal. Tuesday 9 January Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Credit: AFP House of Saud: A Family at War BBC Two, 9.00pm This detailed three-part series on the ruling family of Saudi Arabia makes for unmissable if terrifying television. Dispensing with any sort of Adam Curtis-style frills, the opening film simply talks us through the House of Saud’s involvement in recent history, from Sarajevo to Syria. Hearing from intelligence analysts and long-time Saudi observers, it builds a complicated picture of the uneasy relationship between the Saudi royal family and Wahhabism, the particular strain of Islam they promote. It’s a story that encompasses a small hamlet in Bosnia, a family home in India, weapons dealt from Bulgaria to Afghanistan and online films watched all over the world. Much is made of the new Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and his desire for reform (“It’s not a question of how important he is to this – he is this,” announces one observer) but it remains hard to judge just how much of his actions are driven by genuine belief and how much constitute a power grab. Ultimately what lingers is not the political revelations, interesting though they are, but the interviews with the blinded of Syria, the wounded of Iraq, the devastated of Bosnia: the countless casualties of the geopolitical game. Sarah Hughes England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm Tudor England might seem like a subject that has been covered so much that there is nothing new to be said about it. But hold on to those gripes because Helen Castor’s detailed look at the nine-day reign of Lady Jane Grey is an invigorating, intelligent take on the period. Using a wide range of old documents and interesting voices, Castor guides us through Jane’s brief, unlucky life, examining how she ended up as a pawn between two powerful factions and why it was that she found herself raised from relative obscurity to the dizzying heights of the English throne. School for Stammerers ITV, 9.00pm Speech impediments can be devastating to live with, as this thoughtful film, which follows six people living with a stammer, demonstrates. One solution on offer is the intensive McGuire Programme, a residential course that promises life-changing results albeit under tough conditions. 24 Hours in A&E Channel 4, 9.00pm The fly-on-the-wall medical series continues with this week’s patients including Marie, who arrives by ambulance at St George’s Hospital having collapsed at home with an unexplained headache. The Blacklist Sky One, 9.00pm The ludicrous and yet strangely enjoyable US spy series continues with James Spader’s slick Red this week setting his sights on wealthy art thief Greyson Blaise (Owain Yeoman). While Red gallivants abroad Tom (Ryan Eggold) seeks help to identify the bones in the suitcase. SH Inside No 9 BBC Two, 10.00pm This melancholy tale in the excellent comedy anthology is of rivalry and friendship lost. Reece Shearsmith is Tommy, who grumpily agrees to perform with former stand-up partner Len (Steve Pemberton), 30 years after they split in mysterious circumstances. Working Class White Men Channel 4, 10.00pm Rapper Professor Green has been quietly making a name for himself as a film-maker and this fascinating film about white working-class men is one of the week’s highlights. Green’s tense meeting with Britain First will garner the headlines but there is hope here too, with Lewis, the teenage would-be mathematician, the show’s highlight. SH The Fault in Our Stars (2014) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 9.00pm Josh Boone’s film, adapted from the phenomenally successful young-adult novel, about two American teenagers both diagnosed with cancer is wisely observed and tenderly performed, most notably by Shailene Woodley. The basic storyline is so worn it’s close to threadbare – Love Story told it more than 40 years ago – but it comes with enough quirks to give it the appearance of freshness. The Lincoln Lawyer (2011) ★★★☆☆ More4, 9.00pm He won acclaim for his role as enigmatic detective Rust Cohle in the TV series True Detective, but Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey stars here in the sort of courtroom drama for which he made his name. This time he’s Mick Haller, a slick LA defence lawyer who prefers to represent the guilty. However, a wealthy new client (Ryan Phillippe) prompts Haller to address his own past sins. Billy Liar (1963, b/w) ★★★☆☆ London Live, 12.00midnight Best known for Midnight Cowboy, for which he won three Oscars, John Schlesinger ranged from violent thrillers (Marathon Man) to romantic epics (Far from the Madding Crowd) to perceptive human studies (An Englishman Abroad), but he indicated the breadth of his ambitions with this gritty social drama featuring Tom Courtenay as an undertaker’s clerk with extravagant fantasies. Wednesday 10 January Sarah Lancashire Credit: Channel 4 Kiri Channel 4, 9.00pm Screenwriter Jack Thorne follows up the excellent National Treasure with another superbly cast, nimble and dark exploration of contemporary mores. Thorne’s careful research is all over this opening episode of four, yet it never feels didactic or clumsy. Kiri follows the investigation into the abduction of the titular black girl Kiri Akindele (Felicia Mukasa) by her birth family, just days before she is due to be adopted by her white foster family, headed up by Lia Williams and Steven Mackintosh. Sarah Lancashire plays Miriam Grayson, the social worker who allows Kiri’s ill-fated unsupervised visit. Lancashire picks her projects carefully, and this is a performance to rank alongside her Bafta-winning turn in Happy Valley: Miriam is an imperfect Samaritan, trying her best amid funding cuts, weak superiors and a dormant drink problem. From the moment that the girl disappears and director Euros Lyn’s colour palette darkens, the focus seems to be as much on apportioning blame as finding the missing girl. It’s a desperate situation shot through with guilt and human frailty, yet not without humour; another modern tragedy from a writer who specialises in them. Gabriel Tate The Truth About Looking Good BBC One, 8.00pm Cherry Healey and 25 volunteers and experts from the Universities of Sheffield and Sunderland join forces to separate scientific fact from marketing fiction in the £9 billion per annum industry of cosmetics, in particular weighing up the pros and cons of moisturisers and cellulite solutions. Britain’s Brightest Family ITV, 8.00pm Anne Hegerty – familiar as The Chase’s Governess – oversees a new quiz show in which family members must show off their own general knowledge and nominate relatives according to their perceived areas of expertise. A Stitch in Time BBC Four, 8.30pm This fascinating series finds fashion historian Amber Butchart displaying a variety of eye-catching headgear to scrutinise Jan van Eyck’s The Arnolfini Portrait for clues about its subjects and the 15th-century world that they inhabited. Couturier Ninya Mikhaila, meanwhile, recreates the green gown worn by the painting’s pregnant woman. Miriam’s Big American Adventure BBC One, 9.00pm; Scotland, 10.45pm Miriam Margolyes hits Middle America, where she encounters young Indiana summer campers pledging their allegiance, slightly older drug casualties in Ohio and survivalists of all ages in Tennessee. Fighting for Air BBC Two, 9.00pm Campaigning doctor and inescapable TV face Xand van Tulleken examines the grim effects of air pollution on the body, before travelling to Birmingham to bring clean air to one high street using a combination of technological expertise and community goodwill. GT England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm While dedicating three hours to just nine days of British history might seem like overkill, here it almost feels inadequate, such is the wealth of incident and intrigue in Dr Helen Castor’s series. This middle episode follows the five days that determined whether or not Lady Jane would survive on the throne. The reconstructions are decent and the CGI sparingly used; instead, Castor lets the experts do the talking in an engaging piece of narrative history, concluding tomorrow. GT Tunes of Glory (1960) ★★★☆☆ Movies4Men, 4.00pm British director Ronald Neame made some of the best-known films of the 20th century, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Poseidon Adventure, but this was his personal favourite. It focuses on personal rivalries within a fictional Highland regiment after the Second World War. John Mills plays a new, authoritarian CO, and Alec Guinness – cast against type – gives an exceptional performance as his lax, hard-drinking predecessor. JFK (1991) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.55pm Oliver Stone is in conspiracy-theorist mode for this film about the murder of President John F Kennedy. Whatever you make of Stone’s theory that the assassination was an FBI plot, lawyer Jim Garrison’s (Kevin Costner) showdown moment when he demonstrates that JFK was killed by multiple bullets is jaw-dropping. Costner, fresh from the Oscars glory of Dances with Wolves, is a magnetic lead. The Social Network (2010) ★★★★★ Channel 4, 1.10am Jesse Eisenberg is superb as the gauche cyber-geek who became a billionaire in his twenties in this dazzling dramatisation of the story of Facebook. It may necessarily be speculative in parts about Mark Zuckerberg and his invention, but this is a brilliantly scripted and absolutely gripping tale of clashing egos, precocious talent and betrayal. Justin Timberlake and Andrew Garfield also star. Thursday 11 January Cheetahs in Namibia Credit: BBC Big Cats BBC One, 8.00pm One family, 40 different faces. That’s how this beautifully shot three-part series about the planet’s top wild predator, the cat, begins – with a kaleidoscope of feline faces that perfectly illustrates the huge variety and essential similarity between the many different branches of the family. Not all of them are big. One, the rusty-spotted cat – a kittenish, ultra-rare inhabitant of Sri Lanka’s jungles – is so tiny when fully grown that it can fit in the palm of your hand. Although it makes up for its small stature with surprising ferocity. The series took two years and 30 separate filming expeditions to make, travelling to all four corners of the globe to show just how adaptable wild cats have evolved to be. In this opening edition we see not only relatively familiar sights such as cheetahs and lions chasing down water buffalo and giraffe in Africa, but also some rarities, such as a snow leopard searching the Himalayas for a mate. Plus, Siberian tigers and the elusive Canada lynx make appearances. There are surprises, too, in footage of jaguars taking on caiman in the waters of the Pantanal, and pumas hunting penguin on the freezing southern shores of Patagonia. Gerard O’Donovan European Tour Golf: The BMW SA Open Sky Sports Main Event, 8.00am Action from the opening day’s play at the City of Ekurhuleni in Gauteng, South Africa, where Graeme Storm was the winner last year. Having very nearly lost his tour card in 2016, the Englishman defeated Northern Irish star Rory McIlroy in a play-off to win his second title on the tour and his first since the 2007 Open de France. EastEnders BBC One, 7.30pm Mel Owen (Tamzin Outhwaite) returns to Albert Square after a 16-year absence. Last time around she married twice, burnt down a nightclub, was kidnapped and slept with her best friend’s husband. So the producers’ promise of an “incredible” storyline for her comeback is probably, uh, credible. The Cruise: Return to the Mediterranean ITV, 8.30pm More stories of life on the cruise ship Royal Princess. Tonight, with 5,000 passengers and crew aboard, bad weather prevents the cruise ship from docking. England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm The concluding part of Helen Castor’s fascinating account of England’s “nine-day queen” opens on the eighth day of her reign, with armies heading for Framlingham Castle where her Catholic rival for the throne, Mary Tudor, had assembled a powerful force. Within a day, 16-year-old Jane would be betrayed, abandoned and consigned to the Tower of London. But her legacy, according to Castor, was far greater than her brief time on the throne suggests. Transformation Street ITV, 9.00pm Wimpole Street, Marylebone, is home to the London Transgender Surgery, a private clinic catering for some of the estimated 130,000 Britons currently wishing to change gender. This revealing three-parter follows patients from initial consultations through to gender confirmation surgery. Walks with My Dog More4, 9.00pm The simple but engaging series in which celebrities take their four-legged friends for a trek through the UK’s more scenic parts makes a welcome return. This time Hadrian’s Wall, Norfolk and the Welsh mountains are among the destinations. Actress Caroline Quentin leads off tonight, taking her pooch for a stroll around the Helford estuary in Cornwall. GO Great Art ITV, 10.45pm In this second episode of the art series, Tim Marlow moves on to the 19th-century Parisian art collector Paul Durand-Ruel, whose financially risky landmark 1886 exhibition in New York thrust impressionism into the mainstream. Marlow examines his impact, and the lasting influence of Monet, Cézanne, Degas and Renoir. GO From Russia with Love (1963) ★★★★☆ ITV4, 9.00pm Ah, those were the days: the certainties of the Cold War, a beautiful Soviet defector and a chase across the Balkans. Will Spectre avenge the death of Dr No? No chance. Sean Connery was in the swing of things in his second outing as James Bond, pursued by two of 007’s best adversaries, in “Red” Grant (Robert Shaw) and Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya). Terence Young directs. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.15pm This superb adaptation of John le Carré’s brilliant, intricate Cold War spy novel is a triumph. The espionage drama follows the hunt for a Soviet double agent at the top of the British secret service, with Gary Oldman spearheading the excellent ensemble cast, which includes Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt and Benedict Cumberbatch. It’s funny, seductive and suspenseful. GoodFellas (1990) ★★★★★ ITV4, 11.25pm Martin Scorsese’s Mafia masterpiece, adapted from a non-fiction book, has all the qualities of great cinema: it’s thrilling, it’s provocative, it’s stylish, and it’s got a young Robert De Niro in it. Ray Liotta plays the youngster who longs to be a gangster; De Niro and Joe Pesci are in the Mob. Pesci’s mother, meanwhile, reportedly asked him if he had to swear quite so much – the f-word is used 300 times. Friday 12 January Revd Matthew Stafford, Revd Nicholas Lowton, Fr Matthew Cashmore and Revd Ruth Hulse Credit: BBC A Vicar’s Life BBC Two, 8.30pm This amiable new series follows several vicars in their parishes in the Diocese of Hereford, the most rural in the Church of England. It’s the standard heart-warming mixture of births, marriages and deaths – or as likeable Reverend Matthew Stafford, vicar at the village of Much Wenlock, says: “hatched, matched and dispatched” – but, for all that sense of familiarity, it’s well-made and very engaging. This opening episode sees Matthew officiate at a lovely local wedding, and Reverend Nicholas Lowton, the Rural Dean of Abbeydore and Vicar of the Black Mountains Group, deal with the theft of the parish registry books (“whoever did this has got lessons that they need to learn”). Elsewhere, Reverend Ruth Hulse, Team Vicar for West Hereford, organises a funeral for much-loved former churchwarden Barbara. “It’s a huge loss, like losing a member of your own family,” she says. Everyone involved comes out of it well, and Matthew manages to sneak a message in amid the jokes: “I don’t take myself seriously, but I do take God and what I do very seriously,” he notes. So do his parishioners, many of whom admit that he’s helped them see the church in a more favourable light. Sarah Hughes PGA Tour Golf: The Sony Open Sky Sports Main Event, 12.01am The opening day of the tournament at the Waialae CC in Honolulu, Hawaii, where Justin Thomas won the title last year. Room 101 BBC One, 8.30pm Frank Skinner returns with a new series of the long-running show. This opener promises to be a lot of fun given that his guests, Charlie Brooker, Scarlett Moffatt and Pearl Mackie, are not short of opinion. Among the objects up for inclusion in Room 101 are crocodiles, mosquitos and haircuts. Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm The second part of this food and art travelogue sees chef Giorgio Locatelli and art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon visit the Basilica di San Clemente, the Testaccio Slaughterhouse and the Palazzo Colonna. As before, a great deal of the fun comes from the way that each man learns from the other. David Bowie Evening BBC Four, from 9.00pm Two years after David Bowie’s death, BBC Four dedicates an evening to the rock great. First up is Francis Whately’s 2013 film David Bowie: Five Years in the Making of an Icon, which looks at key moments in his career. These include his time as Ziggy Stardust, his reinvention as the Thin White Duke, the making of 1977’s Heroes, and the global success of Let’s Dance. It’s followed by David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust, which looks at how Bowie created his most (in)famous alter ego. Lethal Weapon ITV, 9.00pm The rambunctious remake of the Danny Glover-Mel Gibson films roars back for a second series. It begins with an action-packed episode that sees Murtaugh (Damon Wayans) heading to Mexico to try to reign in partner Riggs (Clayne Crawford) who is still seeking vengeance for his wife’s death. Delicious Sky One, 9.00pm The second series of the foodie drama reaches its penultimate episode, and it’s the anniversary of philanderer Leo’s death, which the families plan to mark with a feast. Naturally, nothing goes smoothly – chef Gina (Dawn French) is pushed to the limits by her daughter Theresa’s (Tanya Reynolds) behaviour, while Gina’s love rival turned business partner Sam (Emilia Fox) takes out her anger on chef Adam (Aaron Anthony). SH The Graham Norton Show BBC One, 10.35pm Expect a super-smooth evening as Graham Norton is joined by A-listers Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, who discuss Steven Spielberg’s political drama The Post, but also share some good anecdotes amid all the mild ribbing. SH The Polka King (2017) Netflix, from today Exuberant Jack Black plays to his strengths in this biopic, based on the documentary The Man Who Would Be Polka King, about a flamboyant Polish émigré-turned-Polka King-turned-convicted Ponzi-scheme criminal. Despite being a film about a scoundrel who swindled senior citizens out of millions of dollars in order to achieve the American dream, it’s surprisingly entertaining, though a more serious consideration of con artists wouldn’t have gone amiss. The Frogmen (1951, b/w) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 4.35pm A pleasingly understated yet atmospheric war drama in which Richard Widmark stars as a tough Navy commander put in charge of a team of demolition divers on a South Pacific island. At first, the arrival of their superior goes down like a lead diving suit, but he soon wins them over by neutralising an undetonated torpedo. Due to the conditions being deemed too “riotous”, the female roles were written out. Get Out (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Get Out is one of the first films expressly to be set in a post-Obama era and is a breathlessly suspenseful exposé of the horror of liberal racism. Perfect, white Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) wants to allay the concerns of her boyfriend, black photographer Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), and invites him to meet her parents. They don’t bat an eyelid over his skin colour, but the film rattles with provocations. Television previewers Toby Dantzic, Catherine Gee, Simon Horsford, Sarah Hughes, Clive Morgan, Gerard O'Donovan, Vicki Power, Patrick Smith, Gabriel Tate and Rachel Ward

What's on TV tonight: Rome Unpacked and Will & Grace

Friday 5 January Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm; Wales, 9.30pm “I cannot imagine anything in life better to do than this,” says the chef Giorgio Locatelli as he speeds around Rome on a Vespa with art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon. Here they return for another of their Italian jaunts, this time taking in the culture and cooking of the Italian capital, and its “divided, opinionated, passionate and unpredictable” inhabitants. The pair make an engaging double act: effervescent, witty and knowledgable. Their journey opens at Rome’s Capitoline Hill, the ancient meeting place of the “great and powerful and the mob”, as Graham-Dixon and Locatelli marvel at the work of Michelangelo before visiting that magnificent display of papal showmanship, the Trevi fountain. “As famous as Italian cream,” says Graham-Dixon, who adds that it was Federico Fellini who gave the fountain cinematic resonance in La Dolce Vita, before he explores how another artist, Caravaggio, captured the city’s soul. Never far behind with a quip or insight, Locatelli comes into his own in the market of San Giovanni di Dio, where he prepares a staple Roman dish – skate with broccoli soup. “This is Rome,” says Graham-Dixon. “Intenso.” Simon Horsford Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency Netflix, from 8.00am This US adaptation of Douglas Adams’s outlandish detective stories returns for a second season with Dirk Gently (Samuel Barnett) on the run from the CIA, while his sidekick Todd (Elijah Wood) attempts to save him. Live FA Cup Football: Liverpool v Everton BBC One, 7.30pm Four weeks after they met at Anfield in the Premier League, Merseyside rivals Liverpool take on Everton once again, this time in the FA Cup third round. The previous match finished in a 1-1 draw and Toffees manager Sam Allardyce believes that his side are capable of claiming a place in European football’s club competitions, as well as reaching the domestic cup finals. But first he must steer his side past their cross-city rivals. That may be easier said than done, as Liverpool have been on fine form going forward, scoring five goals in their last game alone. But for as good as they are going forward, the Kop have been inconsistent at the back – which is something that manager Jurgen Klopp is keen to rectify. River Monsters ITV, 8.00pm; not UTV or Wales Fearless host Jeremy Wade heads to New Britain in Papua New Guinea, where he hears from fisherman about a mysterious big-headed black fish that has on occasion attacked them. Costa Del Celebrity Channel 5, 8.00pm Celebrities used to present “travel” documentaries on their own – now they do it in groups. The latest on the treadmill sees Anne Diamond, Nick Owen, Ainsley Harriott, Christine Hamilton and Vicki Michelle head to the Costa Blanca. Breaking a Monster Sky Arts, 9.00pm A charming rockumentary detailing the machinations of the music industry and the rise of three African-American children in Brooklyn, from heavy-metal street band to securing a million dollar record deal. Luke Meyer’s film follows the remarkable ascent of Unlocking the Truth, a personable bunch of seventh graders with distinctive personalities. Will & Grace Channel 5, 10.00pm American sitcom Will & Grace was groundbreaking for its depiction of gay characters on TV. It now returns after an 11-year absence to a very different world. The question is, does it match up? To an extent, it does. Will (Eric McCormack), Grace (Debra Messing), Jack (Sean Hayes) and Karen (Megan Mullally) deliver with the same zest, but with added relevance – there are references to Grindr, Melania Trump, and fake news. In the first episode, Will and Grace’s political beliefs are put to the test. Graham Norton’s Good Guest Guide BBC One, 10.35pm Graham Norton has a knack for attracting “A-listers” to his sofa but what makes a good guest? Here he gives his advice to the stars. SH Radio 2 in Concert: Tears for Fears BBC Four, 11.00pm Jo Whiley presents as the Eighties synth-pop masters perform a set at London’s BBC Radio Theatre. It includes such era-defining hits as Mad World and Shout. SH Triple Cross (1966) ★★★☆☆ BBC Two, 12.10pm This slow-paced Second World War drama is loosely based on the exploits and autobiography of Eddie Chapman (Christopher Plummer), a British safe-cracker who offered both the Third Reich and British Intelligence his services as a spy while he was a prisoner in the Channel Islands. The lack of suspense makes you wonder if this is really the same director – Terence Young – who did the quick-fire early James Bond films. The Beatles: Eight Days a Week: The Touring Years (2016) ★★★☆☆ Channel 4, 9.00pm While you watch this peppy documentary from Ron Howard, which focuses on the band’s notoriously hectic touring period, from 1962-66, you feel pop history whistling past at speed. “We were force-grown, like rhubarb,” John Lennon observes in one of many well-chosen snippets. It’s a line that chimes with every step Howard shows us the band taking. Bridesmaids (2011) ★★★★★ ITV2, 9.00pm This sharply written and hilarious comedy combining bad taste with good humour is a valiant backlash against sugary chick flicks, but also a poignant evocation of loneliness. Annie (Kristen Wiig) agrees to be her best friend Lillian’s (Maya Rudolph) maid of honour, but finds herself competing with a richer, more elegant bridesmaid (Rose Byrne). Saturday 6 January Jim Sturgess and Agyness Deyn Credit: BBC Hard Sun BBC One, 9.35pm The BBC launches into 2018 with this hard-boiled crime drama from Luther creator Neil Cross. It seems like a standard police procedural at first. Slick detective Charlie Hicks (Jim Sturgess) is paired up with an inscrutable new colleague, Elaine Renko (Agyness Deyn), and they head off to investigate an apparent suicide. Quickly, however, both the case and characters gather complexity. For a start, the main players have enticing back stories: Hicks is involved in a sensitive extramarital dalliance, whilst Renko is psychologically bruised from a recent violent break-in at her home. Equally intriguing, however, is the sci-fi-inspired twist that the investigation takes. We learn that behind the suicide lies an exchange of top-secret information confirming the destruction of the world in five years time. Goofy though this sounds, it gives undeniable tension to the episode as shadowy forces close in on our duo, and nicely sets things up for further thrills should news of the apocalypse break out. Sturgess and Deyn have enough chemistry to convince, and London, at its most relentlessly urban here, provides a bleakly atmospheric backdrop. Toby Dantzic FA Cup Football: Fleetwood Town v Leicester City BBC One, 12.45pm How’s this for a David-versus-Goliath affair, as League One’s Fleetwood Town take on the 2016 Premier League winners at Highbury Stadium? The Leicester have made it to the FA Cup final on four occasions but have never won the competition. The last time they appeared in the final, in April 1969, they lost 1-0 to Manchester City. Darts: BDO Lakeside World Professional Championships Channel 4, 12.45pm Coverage of the opening day of the tournament staged at Lakeside Country Club in Frimley Green, featuring matches in the first round of the men’s and ladies’ competitions. Forty men and 16 women from 17 countries do battle for the coveted prizes, won last year by Glen Durrant and Lisa Ashton. This afternoon, three-time Lakeside champion Martin “Wolfie” Adams takes on the number two seed Mark “Gladiator” McGeeney, before Ashton starts the defence of her title against Wales’s Rhian Griffiths. Hugh’s Wild West BBC Two, 6.15pm; Northern Ireland, 7.45pm Eco-friendly chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall takes us on a nature trail through his beloved West Country for this new series. He starts in the Wye Valley, “one of nature’s secret gardens”, where he introduces us to the Dipper, Britain’s only aquatic songbird. Wedding Day Winners BBC One, 7.25pm Lorraine Kelly and Rob Beckett host this new nuptial-themed Saturday night entertainment show. Two couples, along with their friends and families, compete in a series of challenges to win a televised wedding and lavish honeymoon. The Voice UK ITV, 8.00pm After just one series, last year’s new coach Gavin Rossdale is out nd in comes X Factor success story Olly Murs, as the singing contest begins its staggering seventh run. Emma Willis returns as the host, as the blind auditions get under way. Spiral BBC Four, 9.00pm and 10.00pm One of the first shows to pique our interest in European crime drama, this much-admired French series returned last week for its sixth outing. The discovery of a torso in a suitcase prompted tough police captain Laure Berthaud (Caroline Proust) to return from her maternity leave. This week, Berthaud and partner Lt Escoffier (Thierry Godard) grill two brothers who they believe have links to the deceased, and lawyer Joséphine Karlsson (Audrey Fleurot) pushes her client to plead guilty. Freddie Mercury: The Great Pretender Sky Arts, 9.00pm Rhys Thomas’s 2012 documentary explores Queen singer Freddie Mercury’s attempt to forge a solo career in the Eighties. The insights from his peers and the concert footage are compelling, but it’s the previously unseen interviews with and snippets of his collaborations with the likes of Michael Jackson that prove revelatory. TD Feud: Bette and Joan BBC Two, 9.15pm and 10.00pm Delightfully camp but moving all the same, Ryan Murphy’s dramatisation of this great Hollywood rivalry concludes with one last double bill. Joan Crawford (Jessica Lange) becomes increasingly riled by Bette Davis (Susan Sarandon), as the latter interferes with her performance on their latest film collaboration, Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte. TD West Side Story (1961) ★★★★★ Channel 5, 11.40am The vertiginous energy and heart make this one of the greatest musicals. Jerome Robbins’s inspired choreography needs the biggest screen it can get; when the film’s firing on all cylinders of music, lyrics and motion, there’s little to touch it. Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer are lovers from opposite sides of the tracks, while Leonard Bernstein’s heady score perfectly aids their battle. The Letter (1940, b/w) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 3.00pm By 1940, Bette Davis was the biggest star. She’d just won her second Oscar for Jezebel, giving a performance that typified women of the era – wild, wilful, destructive, bitchy. But in William Wyler’s film noir, based on W Somerset Maugham’s short story, she careened towards tragedy with self-annihilating abandon. Davis plays Leslie, who kills a man in self defence, but an incriminating letter casts doubt on her story. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 (2015) ★★★★☆ Channel 4, 9.00pm Jennifer Lawrence and Philip Seymour Hoffman – in his last film – end the Hunger Games series with an electrifying, high-stakes final showdown. In addition to the two leads, Part 2 groans with the collective talents of Donald Sutherland, Julianne Moore and Woody Harrelson as vengeful modern heroine Katniss (Lawrence) prepares to win the war. Sunday 7 January Michael Palin Credit: BBC Michael Palin: a Life on Screen BBC Two, 9.00pm Telling Michael Palin’s story from his birth to the film Death of Stalin (in which he played Minister Molotov), this profile of the “Nicest Man in Showbiz” is a pleasure from start to finish. First realising his talents in improvised shows for his school friends, Palin found kindred spirits and his comic mojo as part of the Oxford Revue at the Edinburgh Festival, eventually parlaying his skills as a jobbing writer and performer into a series that changed the comedy landscape forever: Monty Python’s Flying Circus was born after an apparently disastrous meeting ended with a BBC commissioner pronouncing sternly, “all right, I’ll give you 13 episodes. But that’s all!” While John Cleese provides the tongue-in-cheek venom (describing Palin as “a sociopath”), Connie Booth, David Jason and Armando Iannucci pay tribute to a versatile talent. An abundance of clips confirm that alongside the comic genius of Python and Ripping Yarns lay a serious actor of genuine heft (as seen in GBH and Brazil), the gifted travel journalist of Around the World in 80 Days and a successful and engaging diarist. Palin, too, chips in with observations and memories, all delivered with charismatic humility and self-deprecation. Gabriel Tate Into the Forest BBC Three, from 10.00am This uneven but intriguing Canadian indie film didn’t find much of an audience when it was released in 2015 but will be now shown online via BBC Three. Evan Rachel Wood (Westworld) and Ellen Page (Juno) star in this dystopian drama as Nell and Eva, two sisters living in a forest with their father in the near future. They find their isolated existence under threat when a district-wide power cut sparks anarchy and increasing desperation in the nearby town. FA Cup Football: Shrewsbury Town v West Ham United BBC One, 1.40pm More potential giant-killing in the FA Cup, as League One side Shrewsbury Town try to cut down West Ham at Montgomery Waters Meadow. The visitors have won the FA Cup three times but haven’t lifted the trophy since 1980, when they beat Arsenal 1-0, thanks to a goal by Trevor Brooking. Shrewsbury made it through to the third round by beating against Aldershot Town and Morecambe. Premiership Rugby Union: Wasps v Saracens BT Sport 1, 2.30pm Having beaten Bath 31-26 at the Rec last weekend, Wasps look to continue their fine form in the new year at home to second-placed Saracens. The away side will be full of confidence, though: they capped off an impressive 2017 with a 46-31 victory over Worcester Warriors, with Jackson Wray and Nathan Earle both scoring try doubles as Saracens ran in six tries at Allianz Park. When these sides last met here, a hat-trick from Thomas Young helped Wasps to a 35-15 victory. A repeat performance here will see them leapfrog Saracens in the table. Dancing on Ice ITV, 6.00pm Back after a four-year absence, Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean return with Dancing on Ice, but they are no longer coaches. They are now be assessing the ice-skating abilities of a dozen celebrities, including Bucks Fizz alumna Cheryl Baker and Great British Bake Off 2016 champion Candice Brown. Joe Cocker Night Sky Arts, from 6.45pm One of the finest of all the white blues and soul shouters, Joe Cocker’s gargling, howling delivery was most famously captured in his performance of With a Little Help from My Friends at Woodstock. This double bill begins with the concert film Fire It Up: Live, and Cocker performing in Cologne on his final tour before his death in 2014. John Edginton’s biographical documentary, Mad Dog with Soul, follows at 9.00pm. GT Attenborough and the Sea Dragon BBC One, 8.00pm David Attenborough pursues his lifelong passion of fossilology on Britain’s Jurassic Coast. The 200-million-year-old bones of an Ichthyosaur must be dug out of the Dorset cliffs, analysed and finally recreated using computer technology. Vera ITV, 8.00pm The eighth series of the murder mystery begins with DCI Vera Stanhope (the excellent Brenda Blethyn) investigating how a respected fraud officer came to be incinerated in an abbatoir. Her enquiries lead her into a close-knit fishing community and clashes with her fellow coppers. The Biggest Little Railway in the World Channel 4, 8.00pm In this extraordinary venture, Dick Strawbridge and a team of fellow enthusiasts attempt to build a model railway to stretch 71 miles from Fort William to Inverness. The project will require viaducts, bridges and even a miniature ferry, all documented over the next five weeks. GT And Now for Something Completely Different (1971) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 10.00pm; N Ireland, 11.30pm Fans of Monty Python’s Flying Circus rejoice – this compilation film is a feast of the comedians’ favourite sketches from the first two TV series. With John Cleese introducing a number of scenes with: “And now, for something completely different”, it’s a fun trip into the archives, including as the “dead parrot” sketch. Captain Phillips (2013) ★★★★☆ ITV, 10.10pm Paul Greengrass (United 93 and three Bourne films) has a rare gift for working with action-thriller material and making something cohesive, layered and complex from it. With this account of Somali pirates boarding an American cargo ship and kidnapping its captain (Tom Hanks), he remains at the top of his game. Hanks may be the big draw, but it’s the pirates who impress, especially Bafta-winning Barkhad Abdi. Stations of the Cross (2015) ★★★☆☆ BBC Four, 11.00pm This cold, preachy German film from director Dietrich Brüggemann plays out over 14 single-shot scenes, each titled after a station of the cross on Christ’s walk to Calvary and to mirror the restrictions of religious fundamentalism. Its story, about a 14-year-old girl who pursues the ideals of Christian self-sacrifice to terrifying extremes, won the best script gong at the Berlin International Film Festival. Monday 8 January Archie Panjabi Credit: ITV Next of Kin ITV, 9.00pm Written by Indian Summers creator Paul Rutman and partner Natasha Narayan, this atmospheric six-part thriller has a fine cast and gets off to an instantly intriguing start. Emmy-winner Archie Panjabi is a smart and sympathetic presence as British-Pakistani doctor Mona Harcourt, who, together with her well-connected political lobbyist husband Guy (Jack Davenport) and wider family, is preparing to celebrate the return from Lahore of her beloved brother Kareem (Navin Chowdhry). His failure to arrive as expected on the day a terrorist incident in London results in four deaths, and brings the city to a standstill. It sets in motion a series of terrifying consequences – the most disturbing of which is the sudden intense interest in the family of the anti-terrorism unit of the Metropolitan Police. It is a credible, and in parts distressing, depiction of what it is like to be an ordinary British Muslim in the wake of such an attack, especially when it emerges that the real focus of the police investigation is not Kareem, but his 18-year-old student son Danny (Viveik Kalra) who had been becoming increasingly isolated from the family in the weeks before the attack. Gerard O’Donovan Star Trek: Discovery Netflix, from today Following an eight-week break, the latest incarnation of the Star Trek franchise returns to complete its debut run. The previous episode ended on a twist that saw the USS Discovery cast out into unchartered space. Unsurprisingly, this 10th episode picks up with Captain Lorca (Jason Isaacs) and crew facing a raft of previously unimagined threats in their eventful efforts to find a way home. How to Lose Weight Well Channel 4, 8.00pm Dr Xand van Tulleken and dietician Hala El-Shafie take a new approach to diet testing, dividing a group of volunteers into three categories: crashers (short-term diets), shape shifters (six-week programmes) and life changers (four-month plans) to see which of the current popular diets are most effective. Silent Witness BBC One, 9.00pm The enduringly popular pathologists-playing-cops drama kicks off its 21st series with a typically slow burn two-parter. As Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) struggles to get over her Mexican ordeal, a close friend (Emma Fielding) goes missing. Surgeons: At the Edge of Life BBC Two, 9.00pm Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham’s busy surgical unit is the focus of this new series following surgeons, theatre staff and patients through operations at the cutting edge of medicine. In the first edition, maxillofacial surgeons tackle a marathon operation on a 53-year-old diagnosed with a major facial tumour. My Astonishing Self: Gabriel Byrne on George Bernard Shaw BBC Four, 9.00pm An actor’s homage to a playwright becomes a fascinating exploration of the life and work of a literary Titan of the early 20th century.George Bernard Shaw was a pioneering socialist, feminist and philosopher as well as the writer of hugely popular plays such as Pygmalion. Here, Gabriel Byrne assesses the character and legacy of a man whose intelligence, charm and social conscience, and ingenuity for self-promotion, propelled him to global renown. GO The Undateables Channel 4, 9.00pm A fresh crop of singletons looking for love includes a rugby-playing chef from Hull with Tourette’s, a bookseller from Cambridgeshire with Asperger’s, and a photography graduate from London with scoliosis. GO Gallipoli (1981) ★★★★★ Film4, 6.35pm Director Peter Weir’s tale of war and friendship in 1915 – one of his very finest films – reaches a devastating finale in the clash between Australians and Turks on the shore of the Dardanelles. Mel Gibson’s race through the trenches with a crucial message – ignore the last order! – is more pulse-quickening than a dozen Bravehearts. You pray for him to beat that whistle every time. Harold Hopkins also stars. Life of Pi (2012) ★★★★★ E4, 8.00pm Ang Lee’s warm, wise and wondrous adventure story, adapted from Yann Martel’s 2002 Booker Prize-winning novel, follows Pi (Suraj Sharma), shipwrecked in the South Pacific with Richard Parker, a Bengal tiger named after the hunter who captured him. Its kaleidoscopic imagery is some of the most advanced ever, but the story unfolds with such simplicity and clarity that it could almost be a silent movie. Logan (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Hugh Jackman’s third – and best – lone outing for his whiskery mutant Wolverine. You might assume James Mangold’s film, set in the near future, where a weary Logan meets a young mutant much like himself, is meant as a sequel to the two other Wolverine movies, but watching it, you’re struck by the thought that this paranoid, violent noir western is the real, shotgun-toting deal. Tuesday 9 January Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Credit: AFP House of Saud: A Family at War BBC Two, 9.00pm This detailed three-part series on the ruling family of Saudi Arabia makes for unmissable if terrifying television. Dispensing with any sort of Adam Curtis-style frills, the opening film simply talks us through the House of Saud’s involvement in recent history, from Sarajevo to Syria. Hearing from intelligence analysts and long-time Saudi observers, it builds a complicated picture of the uneasy relationship between the Saudi royal family and Wahhabism, the particular strain of Islam they promote. It’s a story that encompasses a small hamlet in Bosnia, a family home in India, weapons dealt from Bulgaria to Afghanistan and online films watched all over the world. Much is made of the new Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and his desire for reform (“It’s not a question of how important he is to this – he is this,” announces one observer) but it remains hard to judge just how much of his actions are driven by genuine belief and how much constitute a power grab. Ultimately what lingers is not the political revelations, interesting though they are, but the interviews with the blinded of Syria, the wounded of Iraq, the devastated of Bosnia: the countless casualties of the geopolitical game. Sarah Hughes England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm Tudor England might seem like a subject that has been covered so much that there is nothing new to be said about it. But hold on to those gripes because Helen Castor’s detailed look at the nine-day reign of Lady Jane Grey is an invigorating, intelligent take on the period. Using a wide range of old documents and interesting voices, Castor guides us through Jane’s brief, unlucky life, examining how she ended up as a pawn between two powerful factions and why it was that she found herself raised from relative obscurity to the dizzying heights of the English throne. School for Stammerers ITV, 9.00pm Speech impediments can be devastating to live with, as this thoughtful film, which follows six people living with a stammer, demonstrates. One solution on offer is the intensive McGuire Programme, a residential course that promises life-changing results albeit under tough conditions. 24 Hours in A&E Channel 4, 9.00pm The fly-on-the-wall medical series continues with this week’s patients including Marie, who arrives by ambulance at St George’s Hospital having collapsed at home with an unexplained headache. The Blacklist Sky One, 9.00pm The ludicrous and yet strangely enjoyable US spy series continues with James Spader’s slick Red this week setting his sights on wealthy art thief Greyson Blaise (Owain Yeoman). While Red gallivants abroad Tom (Ryan Eggold) seeks help to identify the bones in the suitcase. SH Inside No 9 BBC Two, 10.00pm This melancholy tale in the excellent comedy anthology is of rivalry and friendship lost. Reece Shearsmith is Tommy, who grumpily agrees to perform with former stand-up partner Len (Steve Pemberton), 30 years after they split in mysterious circumstances. Working Class White Men Channel 4, 10.00pm Rapper Professor Green has been quietly making a name for himself as a film-maker and this fascinating film about white working-class men is one of the week’s highlights. Green’s tense meeting with Britain First will garner the headlines but there is hope here too, with Lewis, the teenage would-be mathematician, the show’s highlight. SH The Fault in Our Stars (2014) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 9.00pm Josh Boone’s film, adapted from the phenomenally successful young-adult novel, about two American teenagers both diagnosed with cancer is wisely observed and tenderly performed, most notably by Shailene Woodley. The basic storyline is so worn it’s close to threadbare – Love Story told it more than 40 years ago – but it comes with enough quirks to give it the appearance of freshness. The Lincoln Lawyer (2011) ★★★☆☆ More4, 9.00pm He won acclaim for his role as enigmatic detective Rust Cohle in the TV series True Detective, but Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey stars here in the sort of courtroom drama for which he made his name. This time he’s Mick Haller, a slick LA defence lawyer who prefers to represent the guilty. However, a wealthy new client (Ryan Phillippe) prompts Haller to address his own past sins. Billy Liar (1963, b/w) ★★★☆☆ London Live, 12.00midnight Best known for Midnight Cowboy, for which he won three Oscars, John Schlesinger ranged from violent thrillers (Marathon Man) to romantic epics (Far from the Madding Crowd) to perceptive human studies (An Englishman Abroad), but he indicated the breadth of his ambitions with this gritty social drama featuring Tom Courtenay as an undertaker’s clerk with extravagant fantasies. Wednesday 10 January Sarah Lancashire Credit: Channel 4 Kiri Channel 4, 9.00pm Screenwriter Jack Thorne follows up the excellent National Treasure with another superbly cast, nimble and dark exploration of contemporary mores. Thorne’s careful research is all over this opening episode of four, yet it never feels didactic or clumsy. Kiri follows the investigation into the abduction of the titular black girl Kiri Akindele (Felicia Mukasa) by her birth family, just days before she is due to be adopted by her white foster family, headed up by Lia Williams and Steven Mackintosh. Sarah Lancashire plays Miriam Grayson, the social worker who allows Kiri’s ill-fated unsupervised visit. Lancashire picks her projects carefully, and this is a performance to rank alongside her Bafta-winning turn in Happy Valley: Miriam is an imperfect Samaritan, trying her best amid funding cuts, weak superiors and a dormant drink problem. From the moment that the girl disappears and director Euros Lyn’s colour palette darkens, the focus seems to be as much on apportioning blame as finding the missing girl. It’s a desperate situation shot through with guilt and human frailty, yet not without humour; another modern tragedy from a writer who specialises in them. Gabriel Tate The Truth About Looking Good BBC One, 8.00pm Cherry Healey and 25 volunteers and experts from the Universities of Sheffield and Sunderland join forces to separate scientific fact from marketing fiction in the £9 billion per annum industry of cosmetics, in particular weighing up the pros and cons of moisturisers and cellulite solutions. Britain’s Brightest Family ITV, 8.00pm Anne Hegerty – familiar as The Chase’s Governess – oversees a new quiz show in which family members must show off their own general knowledge and nominate relatives according to their perceived areas of expertise. A Stitch in Time BBC Four, 8.30pm This fascinating series finds fashion historian Amber Butchart displaying a variety of eye-catching headgear to scrutinise Jan van Eyck’s The Arnolfini Portrait for clues about its subjects and the 15th-century world that they inhabited. Couturier Ninya Mikhaila, meanwhile, recreates the green gown worn by the painting’s pregnant woman. Miriam’s Big American Adventure BBC One, 9.00pm; Scotland, 10.45pm Miriam Margolyes hits Middle America, where she encounters young Indiana summer campers pledging their allegiance, slightly older drug casualties in Ohio and survivalists of all ages in Tennessee. Fighting for Air BBC Two, 9.00pm Campaigning doctor and inescapable TV face Xand van Tulleken examines the grim effects of air pollution on the body, before travelling to Birmingham to bring clean air to one high street using a combination of technological expertise and community goodwill. GT England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm While dedicating three hours to just nine days of British history might seem like overkill, here it almost feels inadequate, such is the wealth of incident and intrigue in Dr Helen Castor’s series. This middle episode follows the five days that determined whether or not Lady Jane would survive on the throne. The reconstructions are decent and the CGI sparingly used; instead, Castor lets the experts do the talking in an engaging piece of narrative history, concluding tomorrow. GT Tunes of Glory (1960) ★★★☆☆ Movies4Men, 4.00pm British director Ronald Neame made some of the best-known films of the 20th century, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Poseidon Adventure, but this was his personal favourite. It focuses on personal rivalries within a fictional Highland regiment after the Second World War. John Mills plays a new, authoritarian CO, and Alec Guinness – cast against type – gives an exceptional performance as his lax, hard-drinking predecessor. JFK (1991) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.55pm Oliver Stone is in conspiracy-theorist mode for this film about the murder of President John F Kennedy. Whatever you make of Stone’s theory that the assassination was an FBI plot, lawyer Jim Garrison’s (Kevin Costner) showdown moment when he demonstrates that JFK was killed by multiple bullets is jaw-dropping. Costner, fresh from the Oscars glory of Dances with Wolves, is a magnetic lead. The Social Network (2010) ★★★★★ Channel 4, 1.10am Jesse Eisenberg is superb as the gauche cyber-geek who became a billionaire in his twenties in this dazzling dramatisation of the story of Facebook. It may necessarily be speculative in parts about Mark Zuckerberg and his invention, but this is a brilliantly scripted and absolutely gripping tale of clashing egos, precocious talent and betrayal. Justin Timberlake and Andrew Garfield also star. Thursday 11 January Cheetahs in Namibia Credit: BBC Big Cats BBC One, 8.00pm One family, 40 different faces. That’s how this beautifully shot three-part series about the planet’s top wild predator, the cat, begins – with a kaleidoscope of feline faces that perfectly illustrates the huge variety and essential similarity between the many different branches of the family. Not all of them are big. One, the rusty-spotted cat – a kittenish, ultra-rare inhabitant of Sri Lanka’s jungles – is so tiny when fully grown that it can fit in the palm of your hand. Although it makes up for its small stature with surprising ferocity. The series took two years and 30 separate filming expeditions to make, travelling to all four corners of the globe to show just how adaptable wild cats have evolved to be. In this opening edition we see not only relatively familiar sights such as cheetahs and lions chasing down water buffalo and giraffe in Africa, but also some rarities, such as a snow leopard searching the Himalayas for a mate. Plus, Siberian tigers and the elusive Canada lynx make appearances. There are surprises, too, in footage of jaguars taking on caiman in the waters of the Pantanal, and pumas hunting penguin on the freezing southern shores of Patagonia. Gerard O’Donovan European Tour Golf: The BMW SA Open Sky Sports Main Event, 8.00am Action from the opening day’s play at the City of Ekurhuleni in Gauteng, South Africa, where Graeme Storm was the winner last year. Having very nearly lost his tour card in 2016, the Englishman defeated Northern Irish star Rory McIlroy in a play-off to win his second title on the tour and his first since the 2007 Open de France. EastEnders BBC One, 7.30pm Mel Owen (Tamzin Outhwaite) returns to Albert Square after a 16-year absence. Last time around she married twice, burnt down a nightclub, was kidnapped and slept with her best friend’s husband. So the producers’ promise of an “incredible” storyline for her comeback is probably, uh, credible. The Cruise: Return to the Mediterranean ITV, 8.30pm More stories of life on the cruise ship Royal Princess. Tonight, with 5,000 passengers and crew aboard, bad weather prevents the cruise ship from docking. England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm The concluding part of Helen Castor’s fascinating account of England’s “nine-day queen” opens on the eighth day of her reign, with armies heading for Framlingham Castle where her Catholic rival for the throne, Mary Tudor, had assembled a powerful force. Within a day, 16-year-old Jane would be betrayed, abandoned and consigned to the Tower of London. But her legacy, according to Castor, was far greater than her brief time on the throne suggests. Transformation Street ITV, 9.00pm Wimpole Street, Marylebone, is home to the London Transgender Surgery, a private clinic catering for some of the estimated 130,000 Britons currently wishing to change gender. This revealing three-parter follows patients from initial consultations through to gender confirmation surgery. Walks with My Dog More4, 9.00pm The simple but engaging series in which celebrities take their four-legged friends for a trek through the UK’s more scenic parts makes a welcome return. This time Hadrian’s Wall, Norfolk and the Welsh mountains are among the destinations. Actress Caroline Quentin leads off tonight, taking her pooch for a stroll around the Helford estuary in Cornwall. GO Great Art ITV, 10.45pm In this second episode of the art series, Tim Marlow moves on to the 19th-century Parisian art collector Paul Durand-Ruel, whose financially risky landmark 1886 exhibition in New York thrust impressionism into the mainstream. Marlow examines his impact, and the lasting influence of Monet, Cézanne, Degas and Renoir. GO From Russia with Love (1963) ★★★★☆ ITV4, 9.00pm Ah, those were the days: the certainties of the Cold War, a beautiful Soviet defector and a chase across the Balkans. Will Spectre avenge the death of Dr No? No chance. Sean Connery was in the swing of things in his second outing as James Bond, pursued by two of 007’s best adversaries, in “Red” Grant (Robert Shaw) and Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya). Terence Young directs. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.15pm This superb adaptation of John le Carré’s brilliant, intricate Cold War spy novel is a triumph. The espionage drama follows the hunt for a Soviet double agent at the top of the British secret service, with Gary Oldman spearheading the excellent ensemble cast, which includes Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt and Benedict Cumberbatch. It’s funny, seductive and suspenseful. GoodFellas (1990) ★★★★★ ITV4, 11.25pm Martin Scorsese’s Mafia masterpiece, adapted from a non-fiction book, has all the qualities of great cinema: it’s thrilling, it’s provocative, it’s stylish, and it’s got a young Robert De Niro in it. Ray Liotta plays the youngster who longs to be a gangster; De Niro and Joe Pesci are in the Mob. Pesci’s mother, meanwhile, reportedly asked him if he had to swear quite so much – the f-word is used 300 times. Friday 12 January Revd Matthew Stafford, Revd Nicholas Lowton, Fr Matthew Cashmore and Revd Ruth Hulse Credit: BBC A Vicar’s Life BBC Two, 8.30pm This amiable new series follows several vicars in their parishes in the Diocese of Hereford, the most rural in the Church of England. It’s the standard heart-warming mixture of births, marriages and deaths – or as likeable Reverend Matthew Stafford, vicar at the village of Much Wenlock, says: “hatched, matched and dispatched” – but, for all that sense of familiarity, it’s well-made and very engaging. This opening episode sees Matthew officiate at a lovely local wedding, and Reverend Nicholas Lowton, the Rural Dean of Abbeydore and Vicar of the Black Mountains Group, deal with the theft of the parish registry books (“whoever did this has got lessons that they need to learn”). Elsewhere, Reverend Ruth Hulse, Team Vicar for West Hereford, organises a funeral for much-loved former churchwarden Barbara. “It’s a huge loss, like losing a member of your own family,” she says. Everyone involved comes out of it well, and Matthew manages to sneak a message in amid the jokes: “I don’t take myself seriously, but I do take God and what I do very seriously,” he notes. So do his parishioners, many of whom admit that he’s helped them see the church in a more favourable light. Sarah Hughes PGA Tour Golf: The Sony Open Sky Sports Main Event, 12.01am The opening day of the tournament at the Waialae CC in Honolulu, Hawaii, where Justin Thomas won the title last year. Room 101 BBC One, 8.30pm Frank Skinner returns with a new series of the long-running show. This opener promises to be a lot of fun given that his guests, Charlie Brooker, Scarlett Moffatt and Pearl Mackie, are not short of opinion. Among the objects up for inclusion in Room 101 are crocodiles, mosquitos and haircuts. Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm The second part of this food and art travelogue sees chef Giorgio Locatelli and art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon visit the Basilica di San Clemente, the Testaccio Slaughterhouse and the Palazzo Colonna. As before, a great deal of the fun comes from the way that each man learns from the other. David Bowie Evening BBC Four, from 9.00pm Two years after David Bowie’s death, BBC Four dedicates an evening to the rock great. First up is Francis Whately’s 2013 film David Bowie: Five Years in the Making of an Icon, which looks at key moments in his career. These include his time as Ziggy Stardust, his reinvention as the Thin White Duke, the making of 1977’s Heroes, and the global success of Let’s Dance. It’s followed by David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust, which looks at how Bowie created his most (in)famous alter ego. Lethal Weapon ITV, 9.00pm The rambunctious remake of the Danny Glover-Mel Gibson films roars back for a second series. It begins with an action-packed episode that sees Murtaugh (Damon Wayans) heading to Mexico to try to reign in partner Riggs (Clayne Crawford) who is still seeking vengeance for his wife’s death. Delicious Sky One, 9.00pm The second series of the foodie drama reaches its penultimate episode, and it’s the anniversary of philanderer Leo’s death, which the families plan to mark with a feast. Naturally, nothing goes smoothly – chef Gina (Dawn French) is pushed to the limits by her daughter Theresa’s (Tanya Reynolds) behaviour, while Gina’s love rival turned business partner Sam (Emilia Fox) takes out her anger on chef Adam (Aaron Anthony). SH The Graham Norton Show BBC One, 10.35pm Expect a super-smooth evening as Graham Norton is joined by A-listers Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, who discuss Steven Spielberg’s political drama The Post, but also share some good anecdotes amid all the mild ribbing. SH The Polka King (2017) Netflix, from today Exuberant Jack Black plays to his strengths in this biopic, based on the documentary The Man Who Would Be Polka King, about a flamboyant Polish émigré-turned-Polka King-turned-convicted Ponzi-scheme criminal. Despite being a film about a scoundrel who swindled senior citizens out of millions of dollars in order to achieve the American dream, it’s surprisingly entertaining, though a more serious consideration of con artists wouldn’t have gone amiss. The Frogmen (1951, b/w) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 4.35pm A pleasingly understated yet atmospheric war drama in which Richard Widmark stars as a tough Navy commander put in charge of a team of demolition divers on a South Pacific island. At first, the arrival of their superior goes down like a lead diving suit, but he soon wins them over by neutralising an undetonated torpedo. Due to the conditions being deemed too “riotous”, the female roles were written out. Get Out (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Get Out is one of the first films expressly to be set in a post-Obama era and is a breathlessly suspenseful exposé of the horror of liberal racism. Perfect, white Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) wants to allay the concerns of her boyfriend, black photographer Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), and invites him to meet her parents. They don’t bat an eyelid over his skin colour, but the film rattles with provocations. Television previewers Toby Dantzic, Catherine Gee, Simon Horsford, Sarah Hughes, Clive Morgan, Gerard O'Donovan, Vicki Power, Patrick Smith, Gabriel Tate and Rachel Ward

What's on TV tonight: Rome Unpacked and Will & Grace

Friday 5 January Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm; Wales, 9.30pm “I cannot imagine anything in life better to do than this,” says the chef Giorgio Locatelli as he speeds around Rome on a Vespa with art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon. Here they return for another of their Italian jaunts, this time taking in the culture and cooking of the Italian capital, and its “divided, opinionated, passionate and unpredictable” inhabitants. The pair make an engaging double act: effervescent, witty and knowledgable. Their journey opens at Rome’s Capitoline Hill, the ancient meeting place of the “great and powerful and the mob”, as Graham-Dixon and Locatelli marvel at the work of Michelangelo before visiting that magnificent display of papal showmanship, the Trevi fountain. “As famous as Italian cream,” says Graham-Dixon, who adds that it was Federico Fellini who gave the fountain cinematic resonance in La Dolce Vita, before he explores how another artist, Caravaggio, captured the city’s soul. Never far behind with a quip or insight, Locatelli comes into his own in the market of San Giovanni di Dio, where he prepares a staple Roman dish – skate with broccoli soup. “This is Rome,” says Graham-Dixon. “Intenso.” Simon Horsford Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency Netflix, from 8.00am This US adaptation of Douglas Adams’s outlandish detective stories returns for a second season with Dirk Gently (Samuel Barnett) on the run from the CIA, while his sidekick Todd (Elijah Wood) attempts to save him. Live FA Cup Football: Liverpool v Everton BBC One, 7.30pm Four weeks after they met at Anfield in the Premier League, Merseyside rivals Liverpool take on Everton once again, this time in the FA Cup third round. The previous match finished in a 1-1 draw and Toffees manager Sam Allardyce believes that his side are capable of claiming a place in European football’s club competitions, as well as reaching the domestic cup finals. But first he must steer his side past their cross-city rivals. That may be easier said than done, as Liverpool have been on fine form going forward, scoring five goals in their last game alone. But for as good as they are going forward, the Kop have been inconsistent at the back – which is something that manager Jurgen Klopp is keen to rectify. River Monsters ITV, 8.00pm; not UTV or Wales Fearless host Jeremy Wade heads to New Britain in Papua New Guinea, where he hears from fisherman about a mysterious big-headed black fish that has on occasion attacked them. Costa Del Celebrity Channel 5, 8.00pm Celebrities used to present “travel” documentaries on their own – now they do it in groups. The latest on the treadmill sees Anne Diamond, Nick Owen, Ainsley Harriott, Christine Hamilton and Vicki Michelle head to the Costa Blanca. Breaking a Monster Sky Arts, 9.00pm A charming rockumentary detailing the machinations of the music industry and the rise of three African-American children in Brooklyn, from heavy-metal street band to securing a million dollar record deal. Luke Meyer’s film follows the remarkable ascent of Unlocking the Truth, a personable bunch of seventh graders with distinctive personalities. Will & Grace Channel 5, 10.00pm American sitcom Will & Grace was groundbreaking for its depiction of gay characters on TV. It now returns after an 11-year absence to a very different world. The question is, does it match up? To an extent, it does. Will (Eric McCormack), Grace (Debra Messing), Jack (Sean Hayes) and Karen (Megan Mullally) deliver with the same zest, but with added relevance – there are references to Grindr, Melania Trump, and fake news. In the first episode, Will and Grace’s political beliefs are put to the test. Graham Norton’s Good Guest Guide BBC One, 10.35pm Graham Norton has a knack for attracting “A-listers” to his sofa but what makes a good guest? Here he gives his advice to the stars. SH Radio 2 in Concert: Tears for Fears BBC Four, 11.00pm Jo Whiley presents as the Eighties synth-pop masters perform a set at London’s BBC Radio Theatre. It includes such era-defining hits as Mad World and Shout. SH Triple Cross (1966) ★★★☆☆ BBC Two, 12.10pm This slow-paced Second World War drama is loosely based on the exploits and autobiography of Eddie Chapman (Christopher Plummer), a British safe-cracker who offered both the Third Reich and British Intelligence his services as a spy while he was a prisoner in the Channel Islands. The lack of suspense makes you wonder if this is really the same director – Terence Young – who did the quick-fire early James Bond films. The Beatles: Eight Days a Week: The Touring Years (2016) ★★★☆☆ Channel 4, 9.00pm While you watch this peppy documentary from Ron Howard, which focuses on the band’s notoriously hectic touring period, from 1962-66, you feel pop history whistling past at speed. “We were force-grown, like rhubarb,” John Lennon observes in one of many well-chosen snippets. It’s a line that chimes with every step Howard shows us the band taking. Bridesmaids (2011) ★★★★★ ITV2, 9.00pm This sharply written and hilarious comedy combining bad taste with good humour is a valiant backlash against sugary chick flicks, but also a poignant evocation of loneliness. Annie (Kristen Wiig) agrees to be her best friend Lillian’s (Maya Rudolph) maid of honour, but finds herself competing with a richer, more elegant bridesmaid (Rose Byrne). Saturday 6 January Jim Sturgess and Agyness Deyn Credit: BBC Hard Sun BBC One, 9.35pm The BBC launches into 2018 with this hard-boiled crime drama from Luther creator Neil Cross. It seems like a standard police procedural at first. Slick detective Charlie Hicks (Jim Sturgess) is paired up with an inscrutable new colleague, Elaine Renko (Agyness Deyn), and they head off to investigate an apparent suicide. Quickly, however, both the case and characters gather complexity. For a start, the main players have enticing back stories: Hicks is involved in a sensitive extramarital dalliance, whilst Renko is psychologically bruised from a recent violent break-in at her home. Equally intriguing, however, is the sci-fi-inspired twist that the investigation takes. We learn that behind the suicide lies an exchange of top-secret information confirming the destruction of the world in five years time. Goofy though this sounds, it gives undeniable tension to the episode as shadowy forces close in on our duo, and nicely sets things up for further thrills should news of the apocalypse break out. Sturgess and Deyn have enough chemistry to convince, and London, at its most relentlessly urban here, provides a bleakly atmospheric backdrop. Toby Dantzic FA Cup Football: Fleetwood Town v Leicester City BBC One, 12.45pm How’s this for a David-versus-Goliath affair, as League One’s Fleetwood Town take on the 2016 Premier League winners at Highbury Stadium? The Leicester have made it to the FA Cup final on four occasions but have never won the competition. The last time they appeared in the final, in April 1969, they lost 1-0 to Manchester City. Darts: BDO Lakeside World Professional Championships Channel 4, 12.45pm Coverage of the opening day of the tournament staged at Lakeside Country Club in Frimley Green, featuring matches in the first round of the men’s and ladies’ competitions. Forty men and 16 women from 17 countries do battle for the coveted prizes, won last year by Glen Durrant and Lisa Ashton. This afternoon, three-time Lakeside champion Martin “Wolfie” Adams takes on the number two seed Mark “Gladiator” McGeeney, before Ashton starts the defence of her title against Wales’s Rhian Griffiths. Hugh’s Wild West BBC Two, 6.15pm; Northern Ireland, 7.45pm Eco-friendly chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall takes us on a nature trail through his beloved West Country for this new series. He starts in the Wye Valley, “one of nature’s secret gardens”, where he introduces us to the Dipper, Britain’s only aquatic songbird. Wedding Day Winners BBC One, 7.25pm Lorraine Kelly and Rob Beckett host this new nuptial-themed Saturday night entertainment show. Two couples, along with their friends and families, compete in a series of challenges to win a televised wedding and lavish honeymoon. The Voice UK ITV, 8.00pm After just one series, last year’s new coach Gavin Rossdale is out nd in comes X Factor success story Olly Murs, as the singing contest begins its staggering seventh run. Emma Willis returns as the host, as the blind auditions get under way. Spiral BBC Four, 9.00pm and 10.00pm One of the first shows to pique our interest in European crime drama, this much-admired French series returned last week for its sixth outing. The discovery of a torso in a suitcase prompted tough police captain Laure Berthaud (Caroline Proust) to return from her maternity leave. This week, Berthaud and partner Lt Escoffier (Thierry Godard) grill two brothers who they believe have links to the deceased, and lawyer Joséphine Karlsson (Audrey Fleurot) pushes her client to plead guilty. Freddie Mercury: The Great Pretender Sky Arts, 9.00pm Rhys Thomas’s 2012 documentary explores Queen singer Freddie Mercury’s attempt to forge a solo career in the Eighties. The insights from his peers and the concert footage are compelling, but it’s the previously unseen interviews with and snippets of his collaborations with the likes of Michael Jackson that prove revelatory. TD Feud: Bette and Joan BBC Two, 9.15pm and 10.00pm Delightfully camp but moving all the same, Ryan Murphy’s dramatisation of this great Hollywood rivalry concludes with one last double bill. Joan Crawford (Jessica Lange) becomes increasingly riled by Bette Davis (Susan Sarandon), as the latter interferes with her performance on their latest film collaboration, Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte. TD West Side Story (1961) ★★★★★ Channel 5, 11.40am The vertiginous energy and heart make this one of the greatest musicals. Jerome Robbins’s inspired choreography needs the biggest screen it can get; when the film’s firing on all cylinders of music, lyrics and motion, there’s little to touch it. Natalie Wood and Richard Beymer are lovers from opposite sides of the tracks, while Leonard Bernstein’s heady score perfectly aids their battle. The Letter (1940, b/w) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 3.00pm By 1940, Bette Davis was the biggest star. She’d just won her second Oscar for Jezebel, giving a performance that typified women of the era – wild, wilful, destructive, bitchy. But in William Wyler’s film noir, based on W Somerset Maugham’s short story, she careened towards tragedy with self-annihilating abandon. Davis plays Leslie, who kills a man in self defence, but an incriminating letter casts doubt on her story. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 (2015) ★★★★☆ Channel 4, 9.00pm Jennifer Lawrence and Philip Seymour Hoffman – in his last film – end the Hunger Games series with an electrifying, high-stakes final showdown. In addition to the two leads, Part 2 groans with the collective talents of Donald Sutherland, Julianne Moore and Woody Harrelson as vengeful modern heroine Katniss (Lawrence) prepares to win the war. Sunday 7 January Michael Palin Credit: BBC Michael Palin: a Life on Screen BBC Two, 9.00pm Telling Michael Palin’s story from his birth to the film Death of Stalin (in which he played Minister Molotov), this profile of the “Nicest Man in Showbiz” is a pleasure from start to finish. First realising his talents in improvised shows for his school friends, Palin found kindred spirits and his comic mojo as part of the Oxford Revue at the Edinburgh Festival, eventually parlaying his skills as a jobbing writer and performer into a series that changed the comedy landscape forever: Monty Python’s Flying Circus was born after an apparently disastrous meeting ended with a BBC commissioner pronouncing sternly, “all right, I’ll give you 13 episodes. But that’s all!” While John Cleese provides the tongue-in-cheek venom (describing Palin as “a sociopath”), Connie Booth, David Jason and Armando Iannucci pay tribute to a versatile talent. An abundance of clips confirm that alongside the comic genius of Python and Ripping Yarns lay a serious actor of genuine heft (as seen in GBH and Brazil), the gifted travel journalist of Around the World in 80 Days and a successful and engaging diarist. Palin, too, chips in with observations and memories, all delivered with charismatic humility and self-deprecation. Gabriel Tate Into the Forest BBC Three, from 10.00am This uneven but intriguing Canadian indie film didn’t find much of an audience when it was released in 2015 but will be now shown online via BBC Three. Evan Rachel Wood (Westworld) and Ellen Page (Juno) star in this dystopian drama as Nell and Eva, two sisters living in a forest with their father in the near future. They find their isolated existence under threat when a district-wide power cut sparks anarchy and increasing desperation in the nearby town. FA Cup Football: Shrewsbury Town v West Ham United BBC One, 1.40pm More potential giant-killing in the FA Cup, as League One side Shrewsbury Town try to cut down West Ham at Montgomery Waters Meadow. The visitors have won the FA Cup three times but haven’t lifted the trophy since 1980, when they beat Arsenal 1-0, thanks to a goal by Trevor Brooking. Shrewsbury made it through to the third round by beating against Aldershot Town and Morecambe. Premiership Rugby Union: Wasps v Saracens BT Sport 1, 2.30pm Having beaten Bath 31-26 at the Rec last weekend, Wasps look to continue their fine form in the new year at home to second-placed Saracens. The away side will be full of confidence, though: they capped off an impressive 2017 with a 46-31 victory over Worcester Warriors, with Jackson Wray and Nathan Earle both scoring try doubles as Saracens ran in six tries at Allianz Park. When these sides last met here, a hat-trick from Thomas Young helped Wasps to a 35-15 victory. A repeat performance here will see them leapfrog Saracens in the table. Dancing on Ice ITV, 6.00pm Back after a four-year absence, Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean return with Dancing on Ice, but they are no longer coaches. They are now be assessing the ice-skating abilities of a dozen celebrities, including Bucks Fizz alumna Cheryl Baker and Great British Bake Off 2016 champion Candice Brown. Joe Cocker Night Sky Arts, from 6.45pm One of the finest of all the white blues and soul shouters, Joe Cocker’s gargling, howling delivery was most famously captured in his performance of With a Little Help from My Friends at Woodstock. This double bill begins with the concert film Fire It Up: Live, and Cocker performing in Cologne on his final tour before his death in 2014. John Edginton’s biographical documentary, Mad Dog with Soul, follows at 9.00pm. GT Attenborough and the Sea Dragon BBC One, 8.00pm David Attenborough pursues his lifelong passion of fossilology on Britain’s Jurassic Coast. The 200-million-year-old bones of an Ichthyosaur must be dug out of the Dorset cliffs, analysed and finally recreated using computer technology. Vera ITV, 8.00pm The eighth series of the murder mystery begins with DCI Vera Stanhope (the excellent Brenda Blethyn) investigating how a respected fraud officer came to be incinerated in an abbatoir. Her enquiries lead her into a close-knit fishing community and clashes with her fellow coppers. The Biggest Little Railway in the World Channel 4, 8.00pm In this extraordinary venture, Dick Strawbridge and a team of fellow enthusiasts attempt to build a model railway to stretch 71 miles from Fort William to Inverness. The project will require viaducts, bridges and even a miniature ferry, all documented over the next five weeks. GT And Now for Something Completely Different (1971) ★★★★☆ BBC Two, 10.00pm; N Ireland, 11.30pm Fans of Monty Python’s Flying Circus rejoice – this compilation film is a feast of the comedians’ favourite sketches from the first two TV series. With John Cleese introducing a number of scenes with: “And now, for something completely different”, it’s a fun trip into the archives, including as the “dead parrot” sketch. Captain Phillips (2013) ★★★★☆ ITV, 10.10pm Paul Greengrass (United 93 and three Bourne films) has a rare gift for working with action-thriller material and making something cohesive, layered and complex from it. With this account of Somali pirates boarding an American cargo ship and kidnapping its captain (Tom Hanks), he remains at the top of his game. Hanks may be the big draw, but it’s the pirates who impress, especially Bafta-winning Barkhad Abdi. Stations of the Cross (2015) ★★★☆☆ BBC Four, 11.00pm This cold, preachy German film from director Dietrich Brüggemann plays out over 14 single-shot scenes, each titled after a station of the cross on Christ’s walk to Calvary and to mirror the restrictions of religious fundamentalism. Its story, about a 14-year-old girl who pursues the ideals of Christian self-sacrifice to terrifying extremes, won the best script gong at the Berlin International Film Festival. Monday 8 January Archie Panjabi Credit: ITV Next of Kin ITV, 9.00pm Written by Indian Summers creator Paul Rutman and partner Natasha Narayan, this atmospheric six-part thriller has a fine cast and gets off to an instantly intriguing start. Emmy-winner Archie Panjabi is a smart and sympathetic presence as British-Pakistani doctor Mona Harcourt, who, together with her well-connected political lobbyist husband Guy (Jack Davenport) and wider family, is preparing to celebrate the return from Lahore of her beloved brother Kareem (Navin Chowdhry). His failure to arrive as expected on the day a terrorist incident in London results in four deaths, and brings the city to a standstill. It sets in motion a series of terrifying consequences – the most disturbing of which is the sudden intense interest in the family of the anti-terrorism unit of the Metropolitan Police. It is a credible, and in parts distressing, depiction of what it is like to be an ordinary British Muslim in the wake of such an attack, especially when it emerges that the real focus of the police investigation is not Kareem, but his 18-year-old student son Danny (Viveik Kalra) who had been becoming increasingly isolated from the family in the weeks before the attack. Gerard O’Donovan Star Trek: Discovery Netflix, from today Following an eight-week break, the latest incarnation of the Star Trek franchise returns to complete its debut run. The previous episode ended on a twist that saw the USS Discovery cast out into unchartered space. Unsurprisingly, this 10th episode picks up with Captain Lorca (Jason Isaacs) and crew facing a raft of previously unimagined threats in their eventful efforts to find a way home. How to Lose Weight Well Channel 4, 8.00pm Dr Xand van Tulleken and dietician Hala El-Shafie take a new approach to diet testing, dividing a group of volunteers into three categories: crashers (short-term diets), shape shifters (six-week programmes) and life changers (four-month plans) to see which of the current popular diets are most effective. Silent Witness BBC One, 9.00pm The enduringly popular pathologists-playing-cops drama kicks off its 21st series with a typically slow burn two-parter. As Nikki Alexander (Emilia Fox) struggles to get over her Mexican ordeal, a close friend (Emma Fielding) goes missing. Surgeons: At the Edge of Life BBC Two, 9.00pm Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham’s busy surgical unit is the focus of this new series following surgeons, theatre staff and patients through operations at the cutting edge of medicine. In the first edition, maxillofacial surgeons tackle a marathon operation on a 53-year-old diagnosed with a major facial tumour. My Astonishing Self: Gabriel Byrne on George Bernard Shaw BBC Four, 9.00pm An actor’s homage to a playwright becomes a fascinating exploration of the life and work of a literary Titan of the early 20th century.George Bernard Shaw was a pioneering socialist, feminist and philosopher as well as the writer of hugely popular plays such as Pygmalion. Here, Gabriel Byrne assesses the character and legacy of a man whose intelligence, charm and social conscience, and ingenuity for self-promotion, propelled him to global renown. GO The Undateables Channel 4, 9.00pm A fresh crop of singletons looking for love includes a rugby-playing chef from Hull with Tourette’s, a bookseller from Cambridgeshire with Asperger’s, and a photography graduate from London with scoliosis. GO Gallipoli (1981) ★★★★★ Film4, 6.35pm Director Peter Weir’s tale of war and friendship in 1915 – one of his very finest films – reaches a devastating finale in the clash between Australians and Turks on the shore of the Dardanelles. Mel Gibson’s race through the trenches with a crucial message – ignore the last order! – is more pulse-quickening than a dozen Bravehearts. You pray for him to beat that whistle every time. Harold Hopkins also stars. Life of Pi (2012) ★★★★★ E4, 8.00pm Ang Lee’s warm, wise and wondrous adventure story, adapted from Yann Martel’s 2002 Booker Prize-winning novel, follows Pi (Suraj Sharma), shipwrecked in the South Pacific with Richard Parker, a Bengal tiger named after the hunter who captured him. Its kaleidoscopic imagery is some of the most advanced ever, but the story unfolds with such simplicity and clarity that it could almost be a silent movie. Logan (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Hugh Jackman’s third – and best – lone outing for his whiskery mutant Wolverine. You might assume James Mangold’s film, set in the near future, where a weary Logan meets a young mutant much like himself, is meant as a sequel to the two other Wolverine movies, but watching it, you’re struck by the thought that this paranoid, violent noir western is the real, shotgun-toting deal. Tuesday 9 January Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Credit: AFP House of Saud: A Family at War BBC Two, 9.00pm This detailed three-part series on the ruling family of Saudi Arabia makes for unmissable if terrifying television. Dispensing with any sort of Adam Curtis-style frills, the opening film simply talks us through the House of Saud’s involvement in recent history, from Sarajevo to Syria. Hearing from intelligence analysts and long-time Saudi observers, it builds a complicated picture of the uneasy relationship between the Saudi royal family and Wahhabism, the particular strain of Islam they promote. It’s a story that encompasses a small hamlet in Bosnia, a family home in India, weapons dealt from Bulgaria to Afghanistan and online films watched all over the world. Much is made of the new Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and his desire for reform (“It’s not a question of how important he is to this – he is this,” announces one observer) but it remains hard to judge just how much of his actions are driven by genuine belief and how much constitute a power grab. Ultimately what lingers is not the political revelations, interesting though they are, but the interviews with the blinded of Syria, the wounded of Iraq, the devastated of Bosnia: the countless casualties of the geopolitical game. Sarah Hughes England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm Tudor England might seem like a subject that has been covered so much that there is nothing new to be said about it. But hold on to those gripes because Helen Castor’s detailed look at the nine-day reign of Lady Jane Grey is an invigorating, intelligent take on the period. Using a wide range of old documents and interesting voices, Castor guides us through Jane’s brief, unlucky life, examining how she ended up as a pawn between two powerful factions and why it was that she found herself raised from relative obscurity to the dizzying heights of the English throne. School for Stammerers ITV, 9.00pm Speech impediments can be devastating to live with, as this thoughtful film, which follows six people living with a stammer, demonstrates. One solution on offer is the intensive McGuire Programme, a residential course that promises life-changing results albeit under tough conditions. 24 Hours in A&E Channel 4, 9.00pm The fly-on-the-wall medical series continues with this week’s patients including Marie, who arrives by ambulance at St George’s Hospital having collapsed at home with an unexplained headache. The Blacklist Sky One, 9.00pm The ludicrous and yet strangely enjoyable US spy series continues with James Spader’s slick Red this week setting his sights on wealthy art thief Greyson Blaise (Owain Yeoman). While Red gallivants abroad Tom (Ryan Eggold) seeks help to identify the bones in the suitcase. SH Inside No 9 BBC Two, 10.00pm This melancholy tale in the excellent comedy anthology is of rivalry and friendship lost. Reece Shearsmith is Tommy, who grumpily agrees to perform with former stand-up partner Len (Steve Pemberton), 30 years after they split in mysterious circumstances. Working Class White Men Channel 4, 10.00pm Rapper Professor Green has been quietly making a name for himself as a film-maker and this fascinating film about white working-class men is one of the week’s highlights. Green’s tense meeting with Britain First will garner the headlines but there is hope here too, with Lewis, the teenage would-be mathematician, the show’s highlight. SH The Fault in Our Stars (2014) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 9.00pm Josh Boone’s film, adapted from the phenomenally successful young-adult novel, about two American teenagers both diagnosed with cancer is wisely observed and tenderly performed, most notably by Shailene Woodley. The basic storyline is so worn it’s close to threadbare – Love Story told it more than 40 years ago – but it comes with enough quirks to give it the appearance of freshness. The Lincoln Lawyer (2011) ★★★☆☆ More4, 9.00pm He won acclaim for his role as enigmatic detective Rust Cohle in the TV series True Detective, but Oscar winner Matthew McConaughey stars here in the sort of courtroom drama for which he made his name. This time he’s Mick Haller, a slick LA defence lawyer who prefers to represent the guilty. However, a wealthy new client (Ryan Phillippe) prompts Haller to address his own past sins. Billy Liar (1963, b/w) ★★★☆☆ London Live, 12.00midnight Best known for Midnight Cowboy, for which he won three Oscars, John Schlesinger ranged from violent thrillers (Marathon Man) to romantic epics (Far from the Madding Crowd) to perceptive human studies (An Englishman Abroad), but he indicated the breadth of his ambitions with this gritty social drama featuring Tom Courtenay as an undertaker’s clerk with extravagant fantasies. Wednesday 10 January Sarah Lancashire Credit: Channel 4 Kiri Channel 4, 9.00pm Screenwriter Jack Thorne follows up the excellent National Treasure with another superbly cast, nimble and dark exploration of contemporary mores. Thorne’s careful research is all over this opening episode of four, yet it never feels didactic or clumsy. Kiri follows the investigation into the abduction of the titular black girl Kiri Akindele (Felicia Mukasa) by her birth family, just days before she is due to be adopted by her white foster family, headed up by Lia Williams and Steven Mackintosh. Sarah Lancashire plays Miriam Grayson, the social worker who allows Kiri’s ill-fated unsupervised visit. Lancashire picks her projects carefully, and this is a performance to rank alongside her Bafta-winning turn in Happy Valley: Miriam is an imperfect Samaritan, trying her best amid funding cuts, weak superiors and a dormant drink problem. From the moment that the girl disappears and director Euros Lyn’s colour palette darkens, the focus seems to be as much on apportioning blame as finding the missing girl. It’s a desperate situation shot through with guilt and human frailty, yet not without humour; another modern tragedy from a writer who specialises in them. Gabriel Tate The Truth About Looking Good BBC One, 8.00pm Cherry Healey and 25 volunteers and experts from the Universities of Sheffield and Sunderland join forces to separate scientific fact from marketing fiction in the £9 billion per annum industry of cosmetics, in particular weighing up the pros and cons of moisturisers and cellulite solutions. Britain’s Brightest Family ITV, 8.00pm Anne Hegerty – familiar as The Chase’s Governess – oversees a new quiz show in which family members must show off their own general knowledge and nominate relatives according to their perceived areas of expertise. A Stitch in Time BBC Four, 8.30pm This fascinating series finds fashion historian Amber Butchart displaying a variety of eye-catching headgear to scrutinise Jan van Eyck’s The Arnolfini Portrait for clues about its subjects and the 15th-century world that they inhabited. Couturier Ninya Mikhaila, meanwhile, recreates the green gown worn by the painting’s pregnant woman. Miriam’s Big American Adventure BBC One, 9.00pm; Scotland, 10.45pm Miriam Margolyes hits Middle America, where she encounters young Indiana summer campers pledging their allegiance, slightly older drug casualties in Ohio and survivalists of all ages in Tennessee. Fighting for Air BBC Two, 9.00pm Campaigning doctor and inescapable TV face Xand van Tulleken examines the grim effects of air pollution on the body, before travelling to Birmingham to bring clean air to one high street using a combination of technological expertise and community goodwill. GT England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm While dedicating three hours to just nine days of British history might seem like overkill, here it almost feels inadequate, such is the wealth of incident and intrigue in Dr Helen Castor’s series. This middle episode follows the five days that determined whether or not Lady Jane would survive on the throne. The reconstructions are decent and the CGI sparingly used; instead, Castor lets the experts do the talking in an engaging piece of narrative history, concluding tomorrow. GT Tunes of Glory (1960) ★★★☆☆ Movies4Men, 4.00pm British director Ronald Neame made some of the best-known films of the 20th century, including The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Poseidon Adventure, but this was his personal favourite. It focuses on personal rivalries within a fictional Highland regiment after the Second World War. John Mills plays a new, authoritarian CO, and Alec Guinness – cast against type – gives an exceptional performance as his lax, hard-drinking predecessor. JFK (1991) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.55pm Oliver Stone is in conspiracy-theorist mode for this film about the murder of President John F Kennedy. Whatever you make of Stone’s theory that the assassination was an FBI plot, lawyer Jim Garrison’s (Kevin Costner) showdown moment when he demonstrates that JFK was killed by multiple bullets is jaw-dropping. Costner, fresh from the Oscars glory of Dances with Wolves, is a magnetic lead. The Social Network (2010) ★★★★★ Channel 4, 1.10am Jesse Eisenberg is superb as the gauche cyber-geek who became a billionaire in his twenties in this dazzling dramatisation of the story of Facebook. It may necessarily be speculative in parts about Mark Zuckerberg and his invention, but this is a brilliantly scripted and absolutely gripping tale of clashing egos, precocious talent and betrayal. Justin Timberlake and Andrew Garfield also star. Thursday 11 January Cheetahs in Namibia Credit: BBC Big Cats BBC One, 8.00pm One family, 40 different faces. That’s how this beautifully shot three-part series about the planet’s top wild predator, the cat, begins – with a kaleidoscope of feline faces that perfectly illustrates the huge variety and essential similarity between the many different branches of the family. Not all of them are big. One, the rusty-spotted cat – a kittenish, ultra-rare inhabitant of Sri Lanka’s jungles – is so tiny when fully grown that it can fit in the palm of your hand. Although it makes up for its small stature with surprising ferocity. The series took two years and 30 separate filming expeditions to make, travelling to all four corners of the globe to show just how adaptable wild cats have evolved to be. In this opening edition we see not only relatively familiar sights such as cheetahs and lions chasing down water buffalo and giraffe in Africa, but also some rarities, such as a snow leopard searching the Himalayas for a mate. Plus, Siberian tigers and the elusive Canada lynx make appearances. There are surprises, too, in footage of jaguars taking on caiman in the waters of the Pantanal, and pumas hunting penguin on the freezing southern shores of Patagonia. Gerard O’Donovan European Tour Golf: The BMW SA Open Sky Sports Main Event, 8.00am Action from the opening day’s play at the City of Ekurhuleni in Gauteng, South Africa, where Graeme Storm was the winner last year. Having very nearly lost his tour card in 2016, the Englishman defeated Northern Irish star Rory McIlroy in a play-off to win his second title on the tour and his first since the 2007 Open de France. EastEnders BBC One, 7.30pm Mel Owen (Tamzin Outhwaite) returns to Albert Square after a 16-year absence. Last time around she married twice, burnt down a nightclub, was kidnapped and slept with her best friend’s husband. So the producers’ promise of an “incredible” storyline for her comeback is probably, uh, credible. The Cruise: Return to the Mediterranean ITV, 8.30pm More stories of life on the cruise ship Royal Princess. Tonight, with 5,000 passengers and crew aboard, bad weather prevents the cruise ship from docking. England’s Forgotten Queen: The Life and Death of Lady Jane Grey BBC Four, 9.00pm The concluding part of Helen Castor’s fascinating account of England’s “nine-day queen” opens on the eighth day of her reign, with armies heading for Framlingham Castle where her Catholic rival for the throne, Mary Tudor, had assembled a powerful force. Within a day, 16-year-old Jane would be betrayed, abandoned and consigned to the Tower of London. But her legacy, according to Castor, was far greater than her brief time on the throne suggests. Transformation Street ITV, 9.00pm Wimpole Street, Marylebone, is home to the London Transgender Surgery, a private clinic catering for some of the estimated 130,000 Britons currently wishing to change gender. This revealing three-parter follows patients from initial consultations through to gender confirmation surgery. Walks with My Dog More4, 9.00pm The simple but engaging series in which celebrities take their four-legged friends for a trek through the UK’s more scenic parts makes a welcome return. This time Hadrian’s Wall, Norfolk and the Welsh mountains are among the destinations. Actress Caroline Quentin leads off tonight, taking her pooch for a stroll around the Helford estuary in Cornwall. GO Great Art ITV, 10.45pm In this second episode of the art series, Tim Marlow moves on to the 19th-century Parisian art collector Paul Durand-Ruel, whose financially risky landmark 1886 exhibition in New York thrust impressionism into the mainstream. Marlow examines his impact, and the lasting influence of Monet, Cézanne, Degas and Renoir. GO From Russia with Love (1963) ★★★★☆ ITV4, 9.00pm Ah, those were the days: the certainties of the Cold War, a beautiful Soviet defector and a chase across the Balkans. Will Spectre avenge the death of Dr No? No chance. Sean Connery was in the swing of things in his second outing as James Bond, pursued by two of 007’s best adversaries, in “Red” Grant (Robert Shaw) and Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya). Terence Young directs. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) ★★★★☆ Film4, 11.15pm This superb adaptation of John le Carré’s brilliant, intricate Cold War spy novel is a triumph. The espionage drama follows the hunt for a Soviet double agent at the top of the British secret service, with Gary Oldman spearheading the excellent ensemble cast, which includes Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, John Hurt and Benedict Cumberbatch. It’s funny, seductive and suspenseful. GoodFellas (1990) ★★★★★ ITV4, 11.25pm Martin Scorsese’s Mafia masterpiece, adapted from a non-fiction book, has all the qualities of great cinema: it’s thrilling, it’s provocative, it’s stylish, and it’s got a young Robert De Niro in it. Ray Liotta plays the youngster who longs to be a gangster; De Niro and Joe Pesci are in the Mob. Pesci’s mother, meanwhile, reportedly asked him if he had to swear quite so much – the f-word is used 300 times. Friday 12 January Revd Matthew Stafford, Revd Nicholas Lowton, Fr Matthew Cashmore and Revd Ruth Hulse Credit: BBC A Vicar’s Life BBC Two, 8.30pm This amiable new series follows several vicars in their parishes in the Diocese of Hereford, the most rural in the Church of England. It’s the standard heart-warming mixture of births, marriages and deaths – or as likeable Reverend Matthew Stafford, vicar at the village of Much Wenlock, says: “hatched, matched and dispatched” – but, for all that sense of familiarity, it’s well-made and very engaging. This opening episode sees Matthew officiate at a lovely local wedding, and Reverend Nicholas Lowton, the Rural Dean of Abbeydore and Vicar of the Black Mountains Group, deal with the theft of the parish registry books (“whoever did this has got lessons that they need to learn”). Elsewhere, Reverend Ruth Hulse, Team Vicar for West Hereford, organises a funeral for much-loved former churchwarden Barbara. “It’s a huge loss, like losing a member of your own family,” she says. Everyone involved comes out of it well, and Matthew manages to sneak a message in amid the jokes: “I don’t take myself seriously, but I do take God and what I do very seriously,” he notes. So do his parishioners, many of whom admit that he’s helped them see the church in a more favourable light. Sarah Hughes PGA Tour Golf: The Sony Open Sky Sports Main Event, 12.01am The opening day of the tournament at the Waialae CC in Honolulu, Hawaii, where Justin Thomas won the title last year. Room 101 BBC One, 8.30pm Frank Skinner returns with a new series of the long-running show. This opener promises to be a lot of fun given that his guests, Charlie Brooker, Scarlett Moffatt and Pearl Mackie, are not short of opinion. Among the objects up for inclusion in Room 101 are crocodiles, mosquitos and haircuts. Rome Unpacked BBC Two, 9.00pm The second part of this food and art travelogue sees chef Giorgio Locatelli and art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon visit the Basilica di San Clemente, the Testaccio Slaughterhouse and the Palazzo Colonna. As before, a great deal of the fun comes from the way that each man learns from the other. David Bowie Evening BBC Four, from 9.00pm Two years after David Bowie’s death, BBC Four dedicates an evening to the rock great. First up is Francis Whately’s 2013 film David Bowie: Five Years in the Making of an Icon, which looks at key moments in his career. These include his time as Ziggy Stardust, his reinvention as the Thin White Duke, the making of 1977’s Heroes, and the global success of Let’s Dance. It’s followed by David Bowie and the Story of Ziggy Stardust, which looks at how Bowie created his most (in)famous alter ego. Lethal Weapon ITV, 9.00pm The rambunctious remake of the Danny Glover-Mel Gibson films roars back for a second series. It begins with an action-packed episode that sees Murtaugh (Damon Wayans) heading to Mexico to try to reign in partner Riggs (Clayne Crawford) who is still seeking vengeance for his wife’s death. Delicious Sky One, 9.00pm The second series of the foodie drama reaches its penultimate episode, and it’s the anniversary of philanderer Leo’s death, which the families plan to mark with a feast. Naturally, nothing goes smoothly – chef Gina (Dawn French) is pushed to the limits by her daughter Theresa’s (Tanya Reynolds) behaviour, while Gina’s love rival turned business partner Sam (Emilia Fox) takes out her anger on chef Adam (Aaron Anthony). SH The Graham Norton Show BBC One, 10.35pm Expect a super-smooth evening as Graham Norton is joined by A-listers Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks, who discuss Steven Spielberg’s political drama The Post, but also share some good anecdotes amid all the mild ribbing. SH The Polka King (2017) Netflix, from today Exuberant Jack Black plays to his strengths in this biopic, based on the documentary The Man Who Would Be Polka King, about a flamboyant Polish émigré-turned-Polka King-turned-convicted Ponzi-scheme criminal. Despite being a film about a scoundrel who swindled senior citizens out of millions of dollars in order to achieve the American dream, it’s surprisingly entertaining, though a more serious consideration of con artists wouldn’t have gone amiss. The Frogmen (1951, b/w) ★★★☆☆ Film4, 4.35pm A pleasingly understated yet atmospheric war drama in which Richard Widmark stars as a tough Navy commander put in charge of a team of demolition divers on a South Pacific island. At first, the arrival of their superior goes down like a lead diving suit, but he soon wins them over by neutralising an undetonated torpedo. Due to the conditions being deemed too “riotous”, the female roles were written out. Get Out (2017) ★★★★☆ Sky Cinema Premiere, 8.00pm Get Out is one of the first films expressly to be set in a post-Obama era and is a breathlessly suspenseful exposé of the horror of liberal racism. Perfect, white Rose Armitage (Allison Williams) wants to allay the concerns of her boyfriend, black photographer Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), and invites him to meet her parents. They don’t bat an eyelid over his skin colour, but the film rattles with provocations. Television previewers Toby Dantzic, Catherine Gee, Simon Horsford, Sarah Hughes, Clive Morgan, Gerard O'Donovan, Vicki Power, Patrick Smith, Gabriel Tate and Rachel Ward

South Africa's lock and captain Eben Etzebeth (C) leaps in the line out during the friendly rugby union international Test match between France and South Africa's Springboks at The Stade de France Stadium, in Saint-Denis, on the outskirts of Paris, on November 18, 2017. (AFP Photo/Martin BUREAU)